I hold the phone up to my face and tap the button to turn the camera around. “Hi there.”
His handsome face fills the screen, inky black hair tousled and wild, and jaw covered in five o’clock shadow despite it being only a little after one p.m. “Hey, babe. It really does look amazing on you.So amazing, that I’m worried you’re gonna steal attention from Elle.”
We both laugh like this is some normal marriage and we’re actually going to attend the wedding together.
A picture materializes in my mind of Joaquin taking my hand and leading me onto a low-lit dance floor, sea breeze gently blowing in from the beach, and then him pulling me in for a slow dance like he did at the yacht club party when he finally confessed to his feelings. Our faces close, and him looking at me with all the love that’s just going to break my heart for the rest of my life because I can’t have him. Regardless of the outcome, he’ll never be mine. I’ll die or have to disappear, but either way, he will never be mine, and none of this will ever be real. No matter how much I want those things.
“Hey,” Joaquin says more quietly, shaking me from my thoughts. “You look sad,querida. What’s wrong?”
My brows draw together, and I recover by tugging at the neckline again. “Oh, nothing. This dress is just a little tight, and it’s a little hard to breathe.”
He sucks in a small gasp. “Ooohhh…” He arches one dark brow. “Is it really the dress, or am I justbreathtaking?”
He holds his chin between his forefinger and thumb, cocking his head and doing a sexy wiggle of his brows.
A genuine laugh bursts out of me. “Oh, you know, I think it probably is you. You’re very handsome, but I know you know that.”
“Idoknow that!” He chuckles, and a blinding white grin stretches across his face. “Seriously though, I hope you’re having a good time. I think it’s helpful for you to be there, with Lili especially. So thanks for going.” He winks at me. “I know you kinda hate shopping.”
“We’re having a good time.” I smooth my hand down the bodice. “Even with super tight dresses.”
“Well, when you get back home, we’ll make sure you get out of every last stitch of clothingimmediately, and I’ll get you nice and comfy.”
Heat pools low in my belly, and my eyes go lidded on their own accord. “That sounds nice.”
It is honestlymaddeningto be this fucking weak for a man. It’smaddeningto have these kinds of casual, playful conversations with him knowing it’s all fake as fuck and will be exposed for what it truly is sooner rather than later.
But the mostmaddeningthing of all is—
“I love you,querida,” he says easily like we have been for the week or so since I let slip the feelings I shouldn’t have during a moment of physical and emotional weakness. “I’ll let you get back to it.”
I smile genuinely enough to mask the pang in my chest that none of this will ever be real, and that I’m steadily approaching the time when he’ll be gone from my life forever. “I love you, too.”
Joaquin disconnects the call, and his face disappears from the screen. Lili is impishly crinkling her nose at me as I hand the phone back to her, and I feel a blush creep onto my cheeks.
“Well,” I say, switching gears and turning to the mirror. “If you guys think this is good, I guess I will get it.”
Lili clasps the phone with both hands and points at me emphatically. “Definitelyyes.”
“And we can have them take it out at the bust a little for you,mijita,” Fortuna reminds me as I step away from the mirrors and start approaching the hall. She flits her hand at the scurrying consultants. “I’ll tell that little girl helping us.”
“Her name isAshley, Mamá,” Lili clips. “She said it like five times.”
Fortuna makes a sassy retort that I can’t really hear as I head down the hall.
The blasting AC causes me to hug myself and rub my arms as I swish in the dress back to the dressing room. I reach behind me to close the door, latch it shut, turn away from it, and my body goes even colder.
Mauricio Cedeño, one of the cartel’s peon soldiers, is leaning casually against the back corner of the dressing room. His black eyes do a serpent-like glint at me while he coils and uncoils his hand into a fist, which is adorned with a set of shiny, chunky brass knuckles.
I back up against the opposite side of the room, folding my arms across my chest and lifting my chin defiantly. “What the fuck are you doing here, Mauricio?”
He unfolds his fingers and lifts his hand to cast an enamored glance at the weapon attached to his fist. “I’m here to pass on a little motivation to you, courtesy of our Don Xavier.”
I jut my neck forward and clench my jaw. “He is not theDon. In his dreams.”
“It will not be long.” Mauricio pushes away from the wall and stalks toward me, his large, muscular frame looming over me, but I don’t move. “Don Marco is not in the best of health. You know that. Which is why Xavier sent me to remind you of how important it is to not fuck up this job. When Don Marco goes away, so does his share. That has a trickle-down effect. But…” He reaches his hand forward to comb the knuckles through my hair, and a shiver of disgust rolls down my spine. “I guess that means little to you since you’re too low in the ranks to see any of it. And that’s why I had to come by to talk to you.”
I gather my hair and throw it over my shoulder. “I guess Xavier is too much of a pussy to come near the Reyes estate again to do it himself, huh? I know that was a reallyclose callfor him last week. Andyoumust be pretty scared, too, since you chose to come to a dress shop instead of the house.” I knit my brows together in mock sympathy and fake a dramatic pout. “Pobrecito. It must be hard beingso scaredof Ernesto and what he’d do if any of you decided to try what Ignacio did. I bet your littlepitocrawled right back up into your body at the mere thought of it.”
