“If you mean by all wrong that you asked me to marry you in the first place, then yes. All freaking wrong.”
“No, I meant. I should have begun with…thisis what I need. The favor, for going to the wedding with you.” His cheeks are still flushed. His breath still heavy. “I couldn’t—I couldn’t ask it afterward. I wanted you to know what you were getting yourself into. So you could decide if you still wanted me or not.”
I raise an eyebrow.
He flushes even more. “Wanted me to come with you to the wedding. Obviously.”
I push my face into my hands and breathe in, one-two-three-four. Out to the count of eight. “This is really bad timing, Carter,” I finally say. “I’m going to bring a thunderstorm to Nate’s wedding and ruin it.”
“No. You’re not.” He sits down next to me on the bed and I have to tighten my body so I don’t fall into him as the mattress dips. He holds his hand over mine. “Let’s do the breath thing together, okay?”
I know he’s looking at me. He is seeing all the ways I am flawed and broken and falling apart. But then he begins counting with me—just like he used to when things were bad after Sky fell—and I stop being self-conscious. I just focus on the deep gravel of his voice, how it’s almost like a lullaby. After five minutes, when I feel more like myself again, I glance out the window. It’s so sunny, it looks like a postcard of a coastal Virginia summer. “Better?” he asks.
I swallow. I don’t want to admit how quickly he made everything better, so I stand. “Get out. I need to get dressed. We’ll talk more in the car.”
The second he leaves, I take a single, shaky breath and focus all my attention on getting ready. The sweetheart neckline turquoise dress, zipped up my right side. The ylang-ylang perfume oil Sage left me when she moved out, spread on my cleavage and wrists and neck. I slip on my high heels, but after trying to stand with my legs in the state they’re in, I wince and grab strappy white sandals instead. I open my purse closet—this armoire I installed shelves in—and let myself have one happy moment as I consider my collection.
It’s Amá Rosa who got me hooked on handbags. She saw me admiring one of her Chanel baguettes, and the next time I saw her, she had one for me. Of course, she wasn’t gracious about it at all. “Now we have to go to brunch, once a month,” she’d ordered. I tried to tell her she didn’t have to pay me for my time, but she wasn’t having any of it. I became her favorite after Sage left. And I think after whatever she went through with my mom, she decided to keep me nearby to spoil me. So now I own three beautiful Chanels, a handful of Chloés, two Louis, and one Cartier satchel. I don’t even want to know what any of them cost. I put my foot down when she tried to bring up getting me a Birkin for my twenty-fifth birthday.I told her I’d sell it, and I would’ve. As much as I’m obsessed with handbags, I would rather have the eighteen grand.
I don’t just have luxe bags. To Amá’s great disgrace, I also have embroidered bags from Mexico, and bright, crocheted bags from various department stores, and lots of handmade leather bags from small businesses all over the world. That’s actually what I grab right now—a handmade crossbody from Italy, consisting of woven white leather. I transfer my wallet and phone and other essentials, and then I’m good to go.
Carter’s downstairs in the kitchen, talking with Nadia over a cup of coffee. He double-takes when I walk in, but I’m slightly annoyed that he just stares right in my eyes and doesn’t say a word about my dress or how I look. “You ready?”
“Yup.” I walk past him and Nadia to the door, but Nadia beats me there, opening it for me.
“Beautiful weather.” Nadia narrows her eyes at me. It’s a warning.Don’t call down a thunderstorm. Or a tornado. Don’t drown my garden or destroy any homes or kill anyone, okay?I grit my teeth and make myself hum in response as I hobble out as fast as I can.
Carter rushes around me to open the car door, and once he’s inside, I don’t even wait till he’s done buckling his seat belt.
“So.” I turn toward him. “You have to be my wedding date for two hours. And in return, I have to be your wife for the rest of my life. Did I get that right?”
He blows out his hair, hollowing his cheeks as he starts the car. “Not exactly.”
I wait for all of five seconds before I huff. “Carter. Any freaking day now.”
He runs a hand over his hair. It’s too short to stick up or anything, but he still feels rumpled. “It’s my abuela Erika. You remember her?”
I snort. “The abuela who accused me of being a loose woman out to ruin her precious, perfect grandson when I first met her at the age of eleven? How could I forget such a lady?”
Nothing I’d said was an exaggeration. Crochety old Erika had taken one look at me and decided I was no good for Carter. To this day, I haven’t the faintest idea as to why. Maybe it was ’cause I’d just started wearing a training bra, and at nine, Carter was nowhere near puberty. But it’s not like I looked at him—or anyone besides AJ McLean of the Backstreet Boys—likethat, anyhow. And even in my raunchiest fantasies, all AJ and I did was hold hands and peck one another on the cheeks.
It was Carter’s mom’s birthday party, and Erika told anyone who’d listen—especially if I was in earshot—what a horrible decision his mom was making, letting him play with the likes of me. It wasn’t the first time in my life I’d felt like there was something irreparably wrong with me, but it was the first time anyone had been so direct about pointing it out.
“After Eugenio died—”
I grab Carter’s arm. “Abuelo Gene died? Carter, when?”
He keeps his eyes on the road. “Six months ago.”
I gasp. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
Carter doesn’t answer at all. Instead, his jaw clenches, and a wave of something I recognize all too well flashes over his face and arms and fists. Anger.
We weren’t talking six months ago. Because I kissed him and then ran into Nate Bowen’s arms two nights later.
I turn toward my window, watching as the pines turn to palms the closer we get to the ocean. “I’m just saying. I wish I could’ve gone to his funeral.”
Carter’s grandfather Gene was the closest thing he’d ever had to a dad. Heck, he was the closest thingI’dever had to a dad.Sure, he was married to Erika the nasty old brat, but every day after school, he taught me and C. how to play dominoes, and then he’d take us to the panaderia for flaky pastries filled with guava and sweet cheese. He let us sip café Cubano, even though both of our parental guardians wouldn’t have approved. His parental guardian being his mother, and mine being Sage.
