21. We’re gonna need a bigger boat #4
“Rafa likes to take care of his people, no matter how much he pretends to be an antisocial grouch.” Mandeep laughed like wind chimes.
I’d always thought that was a figure of speech, but his mirth was actually musical.
“He won’t help me rearrange furniture, though.
That big diva actually told me his muscles are for fighting, not manual labor. ”
I snorted. “I guess I’m lucky he helped me move.”
“Now I know it’s true love!” Mandeep held his hand out. “Give me your phone, please. I’ll put my number in so you can reach me if you ever need anything.”
“Thank you, Mandeep.”
“You can call me Manny.” His eyes twinkled. “Let’s do brunch sometime.”
Someone called Mandeep away. He gave me a wink as he left, and I raised my glass to him.
“Well, you’re a surprise,” said a silky, feminine voice.
Floral perfume socked me in the nose, knocking loose a sneeze. Lavender. Electrified, I sprang to my feet.
Molly Lively stood there in an expensively simple beige dress, perfect blond hair, and artfully minimal makeup.
Even if I hadn’t heard Mandeep’s stories, conventionally beautiful women made me nervous.
Throughout my life, so many of those beauties had stepped on me to bolster their self-esteem.
It wore through my nerves and my confidence.
More than once in high school and college, a more conventionally attractive “friend” had deliberately dated a guy I was interested in.
Not because she wanted him, but because she could.
I recognized my bias and fought to keep it in check, but it too often turned out exactly how I expected.
“In what way?” I tried to keep my voice neutral, but it wavered with uncertainty.
Molly smirked and sipped her champagne. “You just…aren’t Rafael’s usual type.”
Not so pretty on the inside. I took a steadying breath. Grey rock. Don’t give her what she wants. “You must know him really well after all this time.”
She shrugged prettily. “We used to fuck.”
I choked on my champagne.
“Rafael gets fixated on his little pet projects for a few months, then he tosses them aside when he gets bored. Better keep it casual, girlie-pop. He’ll eat you alive.
” She waggled a pointed pink fingernail in my face.
“At best, you’ll be disappointed. If I couldn’t convince him to use that big dick the right way, you sure as hell can’t.
” She shook her head, tossing her blond waves. “What a fucking waste.”
I sucked in a breath as my stomach dropped through the floor. Goddamn, that stung. But ‘the right way’? ‘A fucking waste’? Oh, fuck this chick. Right between the eyes with a nail bat.
Molly did not relent. “You know he’s a psycho, right? Piss him off on the wrong day, and you’ll end up in the hospital like I did. I’m telling you this for your own good.”
Suddenly it was hard to breathe, and too hot. My face was burning. All my logical protests melted in the blaze.
She maintained a bored expression, but malicious glee danced in Molly’s hazel eyes. “You look like you could take a couple of hits at least, since you’re built like a punching bag.”
Too many words fought to fit through the blistering space between my brain and my tongue. All I could do was blink rapidly and sniff back the searing, humiliating tears.
Rafael came back. “Sorry. Kathy is impossible to ignore and—Molly, why the fuck are you here?” He frowned and caught me by the shoulders, crouching to look me in the eye. “Elaine, are you ok?”
I stared resolutely at the floor, blinking rapidly to fight back the sting of tears. No, I can’t have a meltdown here. Molly is just fucking with me.
Molly examined her manicure. “I thought you liked ‘em tougher than that, Rafa.”
Rafael tucked me against his chest. His voice dropped to a growl that raised the hair on my arms. “Molly, what the fuck did you say to her?”
“I told her the truth.”
He lifted my chin with his thumb, forcing me to look at him. “Tell me exactly what she said.”
I treated it like a recital, detached and far away so I wouldn’t tumble headlong into the pit opening beneath my feet. I left out the comments about his dick, though. No need to pass along that cruelty.
Rafael tensed more and more as I spoke; lines deepening in his face with each word. When I finished, he was silent for so long that both Molly and I fidgeted. She turned to walk away, and his hand shot out, catching her arm.
In a voice so low I could barely understand him, Rafael snarled, “You do not look at her; you do not talk to her. You do not breathe in her direction, do you understand?”
“Rafael, stop,” I said, dizzy with dread. Or tried to. No words came out.
He released Molly’s arm, growling, “If you ever upset Elaine again, I will break your face too, bitch.”
“You’re a fucking monster!” Molly turned on a stiletto heel and fled toward the ladies’ room.
I wanted to vomit. Too much, too fast. I pushed away from him.
Rafael reached for my face, and I flinched. Hurt flickered in his eyes. He stalked outside, calling for the valet. I drifted after him in a daze.
1 “Sharks” by The Warning