Chapter 2
There were several things I’d rather do than go to my monthly family dinner. Like swimming naked and covered in blood with sharks. Or telling my impossible-to-please client to go and royally fuck herself.
Hell, I’d happily take a lobotomy at this point.
Walking into my family home, I no longer found it surprising that my mother had redecorated it once again.
This year’s theme was apparently asylum white and eye-watering gold.
I mean, the carpets were actually glittering gold for crying out loud.
Whoever was influencing my mother’s taste in decorating really needed to get their eyes tested.
“Ms. Garcia,” Gretchen welcomed me. “Can I take your coat?”
Gretchen had been with us since I was four years old, practically raising my sister and me while our parents focused on their careers and social lives. She remained the one and only member of family staff who could handle my mother’s mood swings.
“Thanks, Gretchen.” I shrugged off my coat. “Is Maya here yet?”
“Not yet, I believe she is running late.”
Of course she was.
My big sister would be late for her own funeral if given the opportunity.
“Your mother is upstairs on a call,” Gretchen continued, “but your father is in the study if you wish to say hello.”
Much like my sister, my mother also never arrived at an event early, or on time, for that matter. She was a firm believer in ‘making an entrance’.
My mother, former Miss América Latina, wanted every pair of eyes on her when she entered a room.
Blinking against the brightness of the fresh white walls leading to the study, I knocked on the door. Rule number one in the Garcia household: never enter a room without knocking.
Not only because it was polite. But because Maya was still scarred from walking in on our mother enjoying some alone time with a bright pink dildo.
A faint clearing of a throat sounded through the wood, granting me access.
Thankfully, my mother’s redecorating never reached the sanctity of the study. This was, and always would be, the one place that was completely off limits to her.
I always forgot how quiet this room was.
Dimly lit by the open fireplace, the room smelled like old books and tobacco as if the very air hadn’t been disturbed in years.
Honestly, it was the only room in the house that I liked.
“Hola Papá,” I said quietly, careful not to disturb the many piles of vintage classical books littering the floor.
Fernando Garcia had always been a man of few words. In both his business as the successful and wealthy owner of a renowned supermarket chain, and his personal life.
When he entered our lives, I was six years old and in desperate need of a father figure.
Blame it on watching too many movies, but when my mother married Fernando and pressured him into legally adopting Maya and me, I pictured us transforming into one big happy family.
That I would finally have a dad in my life who doted on his daughters, who would play dress-up with me, host princess tea-parties, and show up to my piano recitals.
It didn’t take long to realize that Fernando was going to be a father in title only.
As an adult, I’ve come to accept that the only reason my mother pushed him into the adoption was to ensure that if their marriage failed, she would be entitled to more than half of his money.
“How are you, Papá?”
Without looking up from his book, he said, “You look tired.”
The understatement of the year.
I was beyond tired.
It wasn’t just my newest client, who I was pretty freaking sure was the devil reincarnated, sent to test me and keep me up at night.
Nor was it because I had gone behind my family’s back and was now responsible for the one person I was sworn to stay away from.
My exhaustion came from the deep-seated feeling in my stomach that told me coming to dinner tonight was a mistake.
It was the main reason I tossed and turned all night, the reason I couldn’t think straight at work today, and the reason I double-booked the same caterer for two different events on the same day.
Thankfully, Kellie, my assistant and living godsend, noticed and rectified it before it became an issue.
Monthly dinners with my family were hard at the best of times.
My mother picked fault with everything in my life.
On the outside, Sophia Garcia was an angel, a beautiful woman inside and out.
But that was only a mask she adorned. The reality being my own mother resented me for not bending to her whim and following the path she crafted and laid out for me the second I was born.
As she so politely put it, I was wasting the natural beauty genes she passed down to me to plan parties.
She didn’t understand, nor did she want to understand, that I loved my job, no matter how tired it sometimes left me.
But truthfully, all that wasn’t why I fought back the urge to vomit the entire car ride over.
Fernando finally closed his book. “Livi, I know after everything that has happened, coming here isn’t—” He stopped with a long sigh, his fingers tapping the spine of the book. “Dinner will be served soon.”
Like I said, a man of few words.
He never once acted like a real father to me.
Never offered me advice, never hugged me when I cried, never stood up for me whenever my mother tore me apart.
He only agreed to take the title of ‘father’ to boost his public appearance; it wasn’t like he was suddenly going to grow a set of fatherly instincts and start acting like one now.
Leaving him behind, I slowly dragged my feet to the dining room.
Appearances were a big thing for the Garcia family. Which meant even our family dinners were obscene. No such thing as pizza on paper plates with boxed wine or gathering around the coffee table in the living room to eat greasy burgers and binge-watch television together.
God, no. The sheer horror of such an idea.
Instead, the table is dressed to impress. White linen, gold freaking plates and cutlery, and crystal wine glasses. Everything coordinated down to the gold-plated napkin rings.
A centerpiece of white lilies ran the length of the twelve-person table like something out of a lifestyle magazine.
Exactly how my mother liked it.
Eyes trailing from the blooming flowers, my attention drifted to the pair sitting at the end of the table.
Maya dared a glance in my direction, tucking a loose curl behind her ear. Her tongue rolled along her bottom lip before she plastered on that famous smile of hers, the smile that put her on the front page of magazines.
It wasn’t until I looked beside her that I stopped walking as if I’d hit an invisible wall.
It didn’t matter how many times I had seen them together, because the second I watched Daniel—the same Daniel who used to kiss me, hold me, love me—place his hand atop Maya’s, my stomach and heart violently reacted without permission.
For a split second, I considered turning and running straight out the front door to the safety of my car.
But it was too late.
My mother appeared behind me, her gold-tipped nails gripping my shoulder, rooting me from making my escape.
“Oh, good, everyone is here.” She guided me toward the table and practically forced me into the chair facing Maya and Daniel. “I hope everyone is as hungry as our dear Livi seems to be these days.”
Ignoring my mother’s usual comments about my weight, her newest problem with my life, I forced myself to focus on the small gap between the two-headed monster before me.
No matter how much I wanted to scream, to throw one of the wine glasses at the pristine walls, I schooled my expression to remain as neutral as freaking possible.
It didn’t matter that inside I was being split back open.
I knew they’d be here—together. Of course I did. It’s why I wanted to drive my car off a bridge on my way over.
No matter how hard I tried to mentally prepare myself for seeing them, it wasn’t enough.
Her hand interlocked with his. Daniel’s carefree smile and soft brown eyes glued to Maya. Their bodies angled toward each other as if it was perfectly natural and not at all a slap in my face.
It was too much to stomach.
“Isn’t this nice?” My mother adjusted the many wine glasses on the table. The table was set for twelve people for fuck’s sake. Talk about overkill. “It makes me so happy having you all here, mi familia.”
“Where’s Papá?” Maya asked.
“He won’t be joining us,” my mother said bluntly. “He has a business call with a very important supplier that I told him he could not miss.”
Blinking slowly, I stared down at my plate as dinner appeared before me.
The smell of saffron and paprika rice, which normally made my mouth water, brought bile to the back of my throat instead.
Grabbing a glass of red wine, I inhaled the liquid like air and committed myself to a cab ride home tonight.
I felt Daniel’s gaze on me and my body reacted to him like a freaking fool.
Refusing to look at him, I poured myself another glass of wine and nursed it like it was the only thing that mattered in the world.
After several drawn-out minutes of silence, my mother shattered the tension like a colossal wrecking ball. “So, have the two of you told Livi the good news yet?”
My insides twisted.
After a beat, my sister finally flashed me the kind of grin that should come with a neon warning sign. “We’re getting married!” Maya lifted her hand, revealing a fuck-off sized diamond. “Daniel proposed last week in Paris!”
“Paris,” my mother swooned. “I always said you were a true romantic at heart, Daniel.”
Maya stared down at the diamond. “Honestly, I still can’t believe it!”
How the hell had I not noticed when I entered the room? The size of the diamond could cause a solar eclipse.
Words failed to materialize as I stared at the engagement ring Maya was admiring. My heart plummeted through my chest into my very ass.
This couldn’t be real.
This had to be a dream, right? A living fucking nightmare.
Wine did nothing to soothe me, but it didn’t stop me from chugging the remains of my second glass and pouring another.
My mother clapped her hands together. “Isn’t it exciting, Livi?!” She lifted her glass in the air toward the happy couple. “You’re going to make a beautiful bride, Maya.”
Somehow, I managed to lift my glass in unison with the others.
“And Livi,” my mother continued, “I had the loveliest thought this morning during brunch—you should plan their wedding.”
There must have been shit clogging my ears. “Excuse me?”
“Well, you go on and on about how much you love your little party planning job. You often tell us how much it means to you, so why not do this for your sister?”
Everyone else at the table had the good sense to fall silent. Maya had enough grace not to look at me, instead finding the napkin on her lap suddenly very interesting.
Daniel remained frozen, his mouth pressing into a tight line, but his gaze refused to remove itself from me.
He had to know this was a bad idea—no bad didn’t cut it. It was ludicrous, cruel, a joke of an idea.
He, of all people, had to see that, right? So, why the hell wasn’t he saying anything?
I gripped my glass tighter. “That’s a hard no from me.”
My mother laughed as if I had done a stand-up routine for her. “Olivia, no puedes decirle no a la familia. Don’t forget, if it wasn’t for your Papá and me, you wouldn’t have your job.”
There it was. My number one weakness. A weakness my mother knew how to exploit time and time again—the loan that Fernando gave me to start my business, one that I promised myself every damn day that I was going to pay back.
“Mamá, please think about what you are asking of me.”
“You always do this,” my mother sighed dramatically. “You’ve always gotten emotional when something isn’t going your way, a childish trait.”
“You think this is me being emotional?”
If she wanted to see emotional, give me another couple glasses of wine and I’d happily show her fucking emotional.
“Look, I understand it’s a lot to take in, but you’ve had time to heal,” she continued. “And frankly, it’s not a good look holding on to things that are over.”
The words hit like poison-dipped darts.
“I’m not holding on to anything,” I snapped.
“Then prove it,” she said bluntly. “Show some grace. You’ve always been so responsible. So mature. We were so proud of how you handled everything when Maya and Daniel realized they were in love, once you had broken up.”
How dare she?
She was rewriting history.
Maya and Daniel got together before we broke up. But no one would ever be allowed to know that, because it hurt the most important thing of all—appearances.
“You’d be doing your sister a kindness, you know how organization isn’t her strongest suit,” she kept talking. “And I think you’ll find it healing, if you let it be. Closure is a choice, carino.”
Why did I let her do this to me?
Why did I take that loan and sign that freaking contract in the first place without realizing what it meant?
“Livi, don’t you want to help your sister? The two of you used to be best friends.” She pinned me with a look. “Think of it as your wedding gift to them.”
Swallowing against the lump in my throat, I tried to keep my voice steady. “Can I think about it?”
“Of course, carino. Sleep on it.” My mother smiled so sweetly that my back teeth hurt looking at her.
But it was her eyes, those feline-shaped eyes, that told me I didn’t have a choice in the matter.
That one way or another, I was going to do what she said, because I didn’t truly have a choice.
“Now, let’s talk about wedding dresses, Maya. ”
Their voices blurred into static background noise.
My headache thumped in time with my barely healed heart.
Yet, all I could focus on was the man who had once promised to marry me, who swore to love me forever, and was now instead swearing the same thing to my sister.
And somehow, against my will, I knew I was going to help make that happen.