Page 41 of Until Retribution Burns (Beauty in Lies 3)

“Good things I hope,” he chuckled, leaning in to kiss my grandmother’s cheek before taking the chair at the end of the table. The seat surprised me until Gabriel emerged into the room. Gabriel smiled politely, greeting my family as he took his seat next to Odina.

All the Cortes brothers hated Odina for what she’d done to me, but Gabriel thought there was a special place in hell for people who purposely tried to harm their siblings. Watching him settle in beside her, I knew there had to be a strategy to the seating arrangement.

Gabriel had volunteered for Odina duty, trying to intimidate her into cooperating. “I’m sorry I’m late,” he said with a smile. As my parents greeted the brothers, I turned my eyes to Rafe’s and let the warmth of his effort wash over me.

I’d worried that our dinner would go the same as our first meeting and quickly devolve into disaster, but he’d worked to ease up on the over-the-top insistence that he was my life. Working to make my family comfortable went a long way where I was concerned.

“Is Joaquin joining us?” my father asked, latching onto the brother he’d always preferred. The quiet one who would protect me from doing anything foolish when my family wasn’t around to keep an eye on me.

“He got caught up on the phone,” Gabriel answered, making my father frown in disappointment. “I’m sure he’ll come as soon as he’s free.”

“Well, I would be lying if I said I wasn’t disappointed that you’ve chosen a life that will take you so far from your roots,” my grandmother said, changing the subject with her sad eyes meeting mine as I looked away from Rafe finally. I reached across the table to take her hand in mine, ignoring my mother’s protest that it was rude to do it.

“From what Chloe said, it doesn’t seem like Isa had much choice in the matter,” Odina said, sipping at her wine with a malicious grin. The words I’d been about to speak to my grandmother to reassure her that I would carry on our heritage, just in another part of the world, slipped from my mind.

Rafe leveled her with a glare, and the fact that the gruesome look on his face made heat bloom between my thighs should have probably served as a reminder that there was something seriously fucked in my head.

Murderous wasn’t sexy, or at least it shouldn’t have been to any normal person.

“Tell me, Dear Sister,” I said, tilting my head to the side as I mocked her. Every moment spent in her presence showed me the truth more vividly. She hadn’t been my sister for a long while; I’d just been too blinded by my hope that we could find a way past her anger. “Do I look like I have any interest in playing these games with you? Move on with your life, because I sure as fuck have.”

“Language,” my grandmother warned, sipping her wine and glancing at me over the top of the glass. She might have started out as the person I most feared disliking Rafael, but that quickly changed. She’d always been able to see what was right in front of her, and while there may be murky secrets, I had no doubt she could feel the love I felt for my husband and know it was genuine.

Even if it had been born in darkness.

“Oooh, Isa bites back now,” Odina said, giggling as she feigned a shiver. “I wonder who taught you that.” Her eyes slid to Rafe at my side, her gaze tracking down his body in a way that made me feel murderous. I curled my hand around my fork, wondering if the parting of flesh when I stabbed her would feel more or less gratifying than Rafael’s had. “And if I can have a taste.”

I leaned forward, my eyes intent on hers that were so like mine as I bared my teeth in a snarl that reminded me of the one Rafael gave when he went murderous. Instead of fearing what that meant for me, I embraced it. “Watch it. You have no idea what I’m capable of,” I warned.

She leaned forward to match my pose, so that we were two identical copies facing off on either side of the beautiful dining room table. “I knowexactlywhat you’re capable of,” she said, her lips tipping up into a cruel smile. “You’ve always been a bitch. It’s nice that you’re finally letting everyone see it.”

“Careful, Odina. I’m not the one who keeps her sins a secret with her own family, am I? The last I checked, everyone in this room knew exactly what I did wrong all those years ago. I spent my life trying to make up for it. Have you ever owned up to what you did to me?”

She paled, leaning back in her seat as she pursed her lips. “Odina?” my mother asked, raising a brow at her in question. There was no secret that Odina had done everything she could to make my life miserable over the course of our lives. They just didn’t know how severe her hatred had grown while they struggled to find a way to tame her bullshit behavior.

Knowing that Rafael had been there the day that she’d drugged me, even if my own memory of it was hazy, it had probably been foolish to bring it up. But even Odina had to know that claiming Rafe’s presence over a year before I knew him would be difficult for anyone to believe. Especially when I had several witnesses who would insist otherwise.

“She’s being dramatic. Nothing happened,” Odina said, rolling her eyes as she crossed her arms over her chest.

“You keep telling yourself that,” I argued, pushing my chair out from the table. I stood, holding my chin high as I stared at her. Rafe smirked into his wine, sipping delicately despite the tension in the room.

The man could have fed on sin and thrived on anger. Knowing him, watching me go toe to toe with my sister for what felt like the first time probably turned him on.

“A word?” I asked, nodding my head to the hall that led to the bathroom and offices at the back of the house, entirely separate from the one that went to the majority of the bedrooms that Rafael’s men claimed as theirs.

“Of course. I missed your lectures,” Odina said, pushing her own chair out abruptly. She lacked all the finesse I’d come to expect of people after spending so much time with Rafael. Her anger made her movements sudden and uncoordinated.

“Girls,” my mother heaved out a disappointed sigh, her voice trailing off as my father quieted her with a placating hand on hers.

“Let them work it out,” he murmured, his voice fading as I made my way to the hallway and led my twin to the office where Rafael worked during his time in Chicago. Shoving open the French doors, I stepped into the space and spotted my book still open on the coffee table in the sitting area where I’d left it earlier that morning.

Odina glared at it, studying the chess strategy as if it was something distasteful. I closed the doors behind her as she moved into the room, cutting off our conversation from the prying ears in the dining room. There was only a matter of time before Rafe grew tired of letting me handle my own conflict.

He wouldn’t take kindly to Odina’s attempts to bully me out of my own family.

“Does your husband have a penchant for romance and fantasy books?” she asked, walking along the shelves at the side of the room and running her hands over the spines of hardcover books.

“No. He likes to make sure I have everything I might need. He had the house stocked before we arrived,” I admitted, not liking the way her touch on the books that had been a thoughtful gift from my husband grated on my skin. It felt too intimate, having her touch something that was so clearlymine.

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