Page 191 of From Rivals to I Do

“What do you want from me, huh?!” He shouted it. His arms flew up in the air uselessly. “You are my brother! You can’t end up with Santiago’s daughter. That just cannot happen here. You know, I could see where this whole thing was headed. As soon as I realized what was happening, I saw it coming. You two were going to get close and eventually, she was going to ask what you did time for and you were going to tell her because you’re not the kind of guy who can just keep his trap shut—”

“Just stop!” I said, backing away from him. “Jeez, Rafael, this isn’t about me! It is about you! You! You were the one who wanted her, but she chose me instead, and you couldn’t stand it.”

“Don’t make this out like it’s some stupid teenage crush,” he insisted. “It’s just so much more complicated than that, Abel. Okay, yes, I do feel something for Camilla, but whether I do or not, you still can’t ever be with her. Don’t you know what it means if she finds out you did time for me?”

“I know it means she’ll run from you. Which is what I need to be doing.” I started walking away. He followed me, grabbing my arm and stopping me before I could reach the door.

“Wait. Please, ‘mano. We are brothers. Brothers are supposed to protect each other. I was just trying to protect you.”

Abel took in the pleading in his eyes. Whether true or not, Rafael meant what he was saying. It hurt to see him that way, determined to uphold his duty to protect his little brother. He thought about the night before and his heart ached. Rafael was in pain and Abel felt like he was the cause.

When he didn’t say anything more, Rafael released him, turning his eyes to the floor shamefully. “I know you’ve got to go to work,” he went on, “but let me make it up to you tonight. We can talk this out like adults. I will pick you up and we will go work it out over pizza.”

Abel’s stomach was turning. As if this could be worked out over bread and cheese. Still, he didn’t like how this was hurting Rafael. It wasn’t fair that his pain should be so absolute over who Abel was falling for.

He backed away from him. “You have to give me time with this,” he said, finally. “What you did…I can’t just forget that.”

Abel did not know what else to say. Rafael shifted his feet from one to another. “I’m still your brother,” he said. Abel did not respond. He just turned and walked out of the door.

On the walk to work, he started working it out in his mind and the further away he got, the clearer his mind became. Rafael might be apologetic for his misdeeds, but he still lied. He still ruined things with Camilla. He still betrayed Abel’s trust. For all his talk of them being brothers and wanting to work it out, not once did he ever apologize for what he had done. He just tried to justify it, tried to explain to Abel why blowing up his life was the best thing for him.

Abel was beginning to wonder if Rafael ever thought of him as anything more than a means to an end. He’d used him to get closer to Camilla. Now, he wondered if he was going to try to make things right or just use the entire situation to endear himself to Camilla. It seemed far-fetched, but so did Rafael punching him out in the parking lot. Could he really ever trust him again?

At work, he stayed in the kitchen as much as possible. Usually, throughout the day, he’d emerge from the kitchen to help at the front desk or in the restaurant. His doing that had become so commonplace that now as he stayed in the back with the heat of the pizza ovens on the back of his neck, he noticed the girls at the front desk peering in at him through the window, separating them to make sure he was all right.

And he did not see Camilla all day. He knew she was there. Camilla would never miss a day of work, even because of a heartbreak. Whenever he did leave the kitchen to go to the bathroom, he’d catch sight of her closed door and know she was in there avoiding him. It wasn’t right that he should be shut off from her this way. By the time the noon rush died down, Abel could not take the silence anymore. He had to fix this...but how?

He went to her office door and paused, second-guessing himself. She wanted to be left alone and he should respect that. He took two steps away, then realized that he wasn’t going to be able to let this go until he’d said his peace. He turned around, took a deep breath and knocked three times.

“Yes?” he heard from inside. He opened the door and walked in. Camilla was sitting at her desk, typing on her computer, a flat look on her face. She glanced up long enough to acknowledge that it was him, then looked back at her computer screen as if he weren’t there at all.

“Can I help you?” she asked coldly.

“I think we should talk.” She did not say anything. She just kept typing. Abel went on, “I know how bad everything looks, but…but it’s not what you think it is.”

“Why did you come here?”

She stopped typing and looked at him directly, daggers shooting out of her eyes. Abel swallowed hard.

“I didn’t know—”

“Would it have made a difference?” The question was rhetorical. He could see it in the angry look on her face that she had no intention of allowing him any kind of answer. “You are lucky I did not fire you on the spot. I can’t believe that you came to work here knowing—”

“I didn’t know,” he said. “Not right away. You said it yourself. This place was different back in the day. How could I have known?”

She just stared at him. Somewhere beyond all the anger in her face displayed hurt. Real, raw hurt. He wished like heck that he could take it away.

“So, when did you know? After the park? Or was it while you were kissing me on the dance floor?”

He lowered his head, the feeling of guilt getting to him. To some extent, he did deserve some of this. He didn’t end things with her as soon as he figured it out and he should have.

“Camilla,” he said with a heavy sigh. “If I had known who your father was, I promise you, I never would have—”

“When did you know, Abel?”

He didn’t want to go to this place with her. Not when it wasn’t even his crime in the first place. “The park,” he said. “But—”

“All the way back then,” she said in a musing tone. Her sapphire eyes were starting to water with tears. “You knew that it was my father you murdered all the way back then?”

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