Page 57 of The Layover

Unimpressed with the name, but my brother had friends with more ridiculous ones. Did he look familiar? No. I was imagining that.

“No. Really. What are you doing here?” Raul slipped his hand into my free one.

I squeezed. It probably wouldn’t comfort him, but I wanted him to know I was here for whatever they needed when it came to her.

Some of Isabella’s fake smile slipped away, and a frown crept in. Oddly enough, the new expression didn’t look any more genuine than the old one. “I just want to see my baby girl. Please.”

Oh hell no.

“No.” Diego put a terrifyingly sexy amount of force into a single word. “And Eloise isn’t yours. Not anymore.”

“She’s staying with family tonight, which you aren’t. It doesn’t matter how often you ask, you left. You’re not seeing her,” Raul said.

I had never been so turned on by something so completely non-sexual before.

“I suppose this… woman… has taken my place?” Isabella sneered.

I stared back impassively. “You left. You would need to have been in a place, for me to take it from you.” That sounded so much more clever in my head.

“Eloise actually recognizes Carly. Adores her.” Diego’s words both warmed and cut through me in a way I didn’t expect. “She wouldn’t be able to pick you out of a line-up.”

Raul stepped forward. “Leave. Now. Or I’ll have you removed from the property.”

“Whoa.” Joystick wedged himself between Raul and Isabella. “She’s a mother who wants to see her child. Who the fuck are you to turn her down? Eloise is her flesh and blood.”

The way he raised himself up to full height, his ink, the sneer in his voice, all made him imposing and almost scary.

But he didn’t hold a candle to Diego’s presence. “Isabella walked out. That was her choice, not ours. This is the consequence.” His tone was hard.

“Because of stress. Postpartum depression. The pressure of living with a public family.” Joystick recited the list with passion. A list likely fed to him by Isabella.

“She left to pursue her acting career,” Raul said.

I wasn’t big on reality TV, but this was the kind of drama I couldn’t look away from. It was also personal, and it shouldn’t be. I hated that this woman had wormed her way into Raul and Diego’s lives. Had abandoned Eloise.

“One of you isn’t even her real father,” Joystick said.

Big mistake.

Diego had Joystick’s shirt in his fist before I could blink, and was raising his other hand threateningly.

Isabella pushed them apart. Not Diego so much—it was clear he wasn’t backing down—but she nudged Joystick back. “Let me see Eloise, or I’ll make my request a legal one next time. My asking you first was a courtesy.”

Raul’s sneer, Diego’s glare, were potent and vicious.

“You won’t come near her. Ever.” Raul growled. “Get the fuck out.”

I wanted to follow Isabella as she walked from the church, and kick her ass. Not that I knew how to do such a thing, but I was willing to learn for this.

One thing I could do, wait a day or two before I reminded Diego again about posting that wedding retraction information. The men would drive Isabella out soon enough, and then we could handle the already fading gossip. Until then, the more that pissed her off the better.

The three of us tried to get back to work, but the men were distracted. Raul called his mother every hour to check on Eloise. Not that I blamed him. We finally decided on the tile, and while they weren’t as happy about it as they had been their first pick, some of that was probably because of the events of the day.

Seriously. Who the fuck did that woman think she was? Vanishing. No contact. Nearly five years. And she just walked back into their lives like it was a perfectly reasonable and normal thing to do.

We decided to call it a day, since we weren’t getting any work done. “If this was Curtis, I’d ask if I should go back to your place with you, to keep up appearances, in case Isabella was watching.” My joke came out strangled. I hadn’t heard back from him, and that made me even more suspicious.

Raul’s scowl was stark. “I hate that he treated you like that. What kind of person does that?”

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