Page 60 of Until Retribution Burns (Beauty in Lies 3)

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Isa

Amiracle had happened. My family sat at the dining room table, polishing off dessert after making it through an entire meal. It was relatively peaceful, a calm before the coming storm as we spoke about little things and nothing of importance regarding my life with Rafe.

My grandmother smiled as she spoke of the kids at the Center, of the difficulties that came with trying to teach a culture that was rooted in nature, in the center of the city. The familiar cadence of her voice as she spoke about her life’s passion was a comfort, a subtle reassurance that maybe we could find our way toward some semblance of normal.

My stomach turned as I picked at the cinnamon rolls I’d made for them, the smell overpowering despite the way my family dug into them. They’d long since been a favorite in our home.

I’d have to make sure my mother knew the recipe.

Rafe eyed my plate, satisfaction in his eyes as he settled on my barely touched, picked-at cinnamon rolls. He’d taken far too much enjoyment out of watching me nearly gag while they were baking, his hands continually drifting to wrap around my stomach as if he wanted to tell the baby he was proud of it for making me sick.

Him? Her? I didn’t even know what to call the baby growing in my stomach, and ‘it’ felt so wrong.

“We did have a reason for inviting you here again so soon,” Rafe said, grasping my hand in his and tugging it up to kiss the back of it. Even knowing that this had been the purpose of the evening, theonlyreason we’d asked them to come back so soon after the way the last dinner had ended, I wasn’t ready.

I bit my bottom lip, wordlessly compelling Rafe to understand that we should wait. That we should let the evening finish without any drama and tell them later, maybe after we had an ultrasound photo to share. Wasn’t the first trimester risky?

Hopefully we’d be home by the end of the first trimester and I wouldn’t have to see the disappointment in my mother’s eyes that her well-behaved daughter was pregnant at eighteen. Husband be damned,thatwas not something that any mother wanted for her daughter.

“Isa is pregnant,” he said, not taking pity on me for the dread making my heart stall in my chest. I shouldn’t have been surprised. He was never willing to wait for me to catch up to the speed that he plowed forward at.

My mother dropped her gaze down toward my stomach even though the table blocked her view, her eyes accusing as she glared at it. “Well I guess that explains the shotgun wedding,” she said, the disappointment in her voice evident.

“We just found out a couple of days ago, actually,” I said, forcing a smile to my face. I couldn’t even blame her for the assumption that it had been an accident and I’d done something stupid. What eighteen-year-old got pregnant on purpose?

One who was married to a ridiculously impatient Rafael Ibarra, apparently.

“We’re both very happy, and I know it would mean the world to Isa if you were supportive of this next phase in her life,” Rafe said, staring down my mother with a warning gleaming in his eyes.

“She doesn’t look very happy,” Odina muttered, her first words since they’d brought her to dinner. I’d notified them she could come, but if she wasn’t on her best behavior she wouldn’t be permitted on the property in the future.

Thathad been a fun conversation, but I hadn’t expected her to show up. Odina had more important things to do than spend the evening with the sister she wanted dead.

My father nudged her with his elbow, making her quiet immediately as I turned a beaming smile toward her. “My happiness and yours don’t look the same. Probably because I can be happy when I’m sober,” I said, smiling sweetly and sipping my water. Odina raised her glass of wine, downing the rest of it pointedly.

“Of course we’ll be supportive if this is truly what you want, Isa,” my father said, smiling toward my grandmother. She nodded her agreement, even though I could see the traces of pain evident on her face. Rafael was nothing like the man she’d wanted for me, a betrayal of our culture on my part that I’d chosen someone so vastly different from her beliefs.

But love was love, even if in my case it shouldn’t have been.

“Of course,” I said, dropping my hand to my stomach and cradling it. I may not have chosen it, but that didn’t mean I wouldn’t whole heartedly love my baby when it came. “I wouldn’t change it.” Rafe’s hand squeezed mine, his hand tightening as he studied my profile. I turned to him, watching him search my face for the lie in the words.

I couldn’t explain how quickly the feeling of responsibility for the baby had taken over. How attached I’d grown, talking to my stomach in the hours he’d left me locked in our bedroom alone. No matter how it had come to be, or how horrible the timing was, the child was a part of both of us.

I had to hope for the best parts, and not the darker impulses that consumed both of us.

“Well, you’ll have to teach her all the ways of our people,” my grandmother said, tears stinging her eyes as she took my free hand in hers from across the table.

“You will teach her yourself,nohkomach,” I said, biting my bottom lip and suppressing the smile that tugged at my lips. Of course the matriarch of my family would assume her great-grandchild to be a girl, even before the first time we heard the heartbeat.

“I hope so,” she said, nodding her head in agreement as she pulled her hand back and used her napkin to dab at her eyes.

My father cleared his throat, pushing out his chair and looking awkward as emotion clogged his throat. “I’m happy if you’re happy, but I would like a word with your husband,” he said, turning his eyes to Rafael.

Rafe smiled, deceptively calm as he glided to his feet. The reassurance of my father’s acknowledgement of him as my husband probably went a long way toward convincing him that he could walk into the conversation without being prepared for war. “Of course,” Rafe said, kissing me on the forehead and walking toward the hallway where his office was located. They disappeared around the corner, cut off from view as I tried not to focus on whatever my father might have to say and what it could mean for the bloom of promise I felt in their acceptance of the baby.

“Have you thought about names?” my mother asked, pursing her lips as she sipped her wine.

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