Page 86 of Out of Control

“Marla? Hi. Is everything okay?” I hold my phone out and look at the screen as if to confirm that she’s really calling me. It’s not like I’m in the market for any more real estate.

“Yes. Of course. I just wanted to call and tell you how freaking brilliant that was.”

Um . . . “How brilliant what was?” I put my finger to my ear and step out of the garage. To my left, in my periphery, I notice Rossi standing down a ways. We lock eyes and acknowledge each other in the only way we can in a place like this—with a stare that’s a little too long. With a curve up of one corner of our mouths. With an ever so slight nod of our heads.

With the invisible string that ties us together.

“The flyer. The contest. The giveaway.”

“I’m sorry. What are you talking about?”

“Don’t play coy with me. During the yacht races today when the town was freaking packed, you had a helicopter toss flyers out the door and pepper the damn town. It looked like it was raining blue confetti.”

“Marla. I didn’t—”

“And the contest is brilliant.”

What the hell is going on here? “Yes. I mean sure.”

“If you want to get local artists involved, get people into the gallery, why not hold a contest to display one of their pieces?” What? “Then have the people vote on it during your grand opening during the art show.” She laughs. “I mean, so much brilliance in that one action. The whole town has been abuzz. Everyone’s talking. People are trying to peep through the torn paper of the gallery. It’s like you lit a torch under everyone and got them all jazzed about artmonte-carlo.”

“Well, that’s great.”

“It is. I must go, but I wanted to tell you how exciting it was and how sad I was you missed it all. I knew you were going to do great things with that place of yours. I just knew it.”

“Thanks.”

Marla hangs up and I stand in the middle of the paddock with my head abuzz, my fingers scrolling through social media to see if what she’s saying is true, and a healthy dose of trepidation that it might be. And sure enough, video after video shows the bright blue flyers being dumped from a helicopter over the marina. It shows people scurrying to grab the flyers. Then it shows the flyer.

And it locks in on my gallery opening—its contest and its giveaway—into the date of the art show.

If I didn’t already know who did this, I do now.

I look back to my left but Rossi’s nowhere in sight. Confused, overwhelmed, and thoroughly shocked, my mind is already thinking of how to spin this. Of how to explain to el patriarca that it was an error, a miscommunication with my assistant, and now I’m forced to open on that date.

Excuses.

Excuses.

Excuses.

I’m so sick of making them. Of living by them. Of needing them.

I stop in the middle of the walkway so that several people bump into me as the epiphany hits.

Isn’t that why Rossi did it?

So I don’t have to make them anymore? He forced my hand so I couldn’t back down, so I couldn’t sacrifice myself for my family . . . so I did something for myself on my terms.

I catch my breath and acknowledge that a fallout will be coming but, you know what? I welcome it. I’ll stand my ground.

It’s not like I have a choice now.

I turn to head to his garage, to wherever he might be, but then stop when I come face to face with my brother.

“Cruz,” I say, startled.

“Someone’s on a mission,” he says, clasping his hands behind his back and furrowing his eyebrows at me. “Something wrong?”