Page 30 of Rafa's Convenient Wife

“Yeah.” Beto offered him the bottle. “Here.”

“I shouldn’t.” Rafael made a point of not drinking when he was upset or agitated.

“It’s your wedding night, bro. If you’re out here with me instead of with your gorgeous new wife, you need a drink.” He shook the heavy glass bottle. “Take it.”

“I’m not with her because it’s not that kind of marriage.” The words rang hollow. Rafa took the bottle from Beto and sank down onto the lounger next to his brother.

“Uh-huh.” Beto sounded amused, and Rafa was sure if he could see his brother’s face through the darkness, there would be a smile on it.

Ignoring his brother, he popped the cork out of the bottle and drank straight from it. He could only imagine the horrified expression his grandfather or father would have worn seeing their progeny drinking like uncouth frat boys. He had broken all the rules of enjoying a quality aged tequila. He hadn’t let it breathe. Hadn’t used a proper glass. Hadn't paired it with a delicate dark chocolate to highlight the notes of vanilla or cinnamon.

“That bad?” Beto reached across and tapped his arm with something. “Here. You probably need this, too.”

Rafael placed the bottle on the short table between them. “What is it?”

“Vape pen. One of Lola’s special ones,” Beto clarified. “I’d share my cigar, but it’s my last one from Nicaragua.”

“Not tonight.” Rafa waved off the vape pen loaded with Lola’s exquisitely mellow THC. “I need to be able to take care of Jasper tonight.”

Beto made a horrified sound. “I don’t think fatherhood is for me.”

“I didn’t think it was for me either,” Rafa admitted.

“Really?” Beto seemed surprised. “I always figured you’d get married and have kids, if for no other reason than to carry on the family traditions.”

Rafa glared at his brother. “That’s a terrible reason to have kids. Besides, there are five of us to carry on the family name and traditions.”

“Four,” Beto corrected gently. “There’s only four of us now.”

An invisible hand clenched and squeezed his heart. “I forgot.”

“It’s strange, right? Like Jaime is gone, but it doesn’t feel real. Not even after the funeral.”

“It was the same after we lost Papa and Abuelo. I can’t tell you how many times I picked up the phone to call one of them or walked to their offices expecting to find them.” Even after all these years, he could feel that gut-wrenching pain.

“Jasper was laughing earlier, before the ceremony, and I took a video of it for Jaime. I started to send it to him—and then I remembered.” Beto’s voice deepened with grief. “Took everything I had in me not to cry right there.”

“It’s okay to cry, Beto.” Rafael didn’t want his siblings to suppress their grief. “You don’t have to hide your feelings.”

“Like you don’t hide your feelings for Sky?”

“That’s not the same thing, Beto.”

“There it is,” Beto said triumphantly. “There’s the hypocrisy.”

“I’m not—.” Rafael swallowed the words on the tip of his tongue. “It’s different.”

“How?”

“I’m telling you not to bottle up the feelings of grief and loss so you aren’t emotionally crippled. What I feel or don’t feel for Sky doesn’t only affect me. It affects her, too.”

“Which is why you should tell her that you love her,” Beto angrily snapped.

Stunned into silence, he stared at his brother’s shadowy outline.

“Don’t deny it, Rafael. I can see it. I saw it today when you were reciting your vows. A business arrangement? Bullshit. You love that woman—and I think she loves you. I think she always has, even after whatever happened at the wedding.”

“Why does everyone assume something happened at the wedding?” he asked, ignoring the crux of the matter. “You and Lola and Dina.”

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