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“The one the elementary school puts on each fall.” Josefina passes the bottle of holy water back to my mom. “About that, it would be so nice if you joined us! Nico would love to see you, and then we can all go out to dinner afterward.”
My throat dries up. As much as I want to see my godson and give him the biggest hug, dinner with those who know me best sounds like another panic-inducing situation I’d rather avoid tonight.
“I’m sure Dahlia is tired,” Julian says in that bored tone of his.
Either I look as shitty as I feel, or Julian is making it known that he doesn’t want me there.
I’ll go with the latter.
I consider attending the talent show to prove him wrong, but then I think about what that would entail.
Are you ready to see everyone in town?
Nope. Definitely not. It was a small blessing to be spared from the welcome party this evening, so I better not push my luck.
After two years away, I will have to face everyoneeventually, but today is not that day.
“Julian is right.” The words slide across my tongue like daggers, and the bastard has the audacity to stand taller at the admission. “I’m pretty shaken up with everything that happened, and after spending the whole day driving, all I want to do is get some rest.”
“Oh.” Josefina’s smile dies, earning me another scowl from her son.
“What if Julian takes you home on his way to the show and Josefina and I can drive your car to the auditorium?” Mom suggests.
My right eye twitches. If this woman hadn’t spent my whole life raising me, I would never speak to her again. She knows Julian is my sworn enemy, right up there with midnight snacking on pan dulce and driving in California rush-hour traffic.
“But…” My protest dies when my mom shoots me a look. “All right.”
Julian’s eyes narrow as he pulls out his keys. “Let’s go. I don’t want to be late for Nico’s performance.”
Josefina’s fingers fly across her cell phone screen. “No worries. I’m texting the principal now and asking them to switch Nico’s spot.”
Julian’s head swings in his mother’s direction. “You couldn’t have done that before I got into an accident trying to rush over there?”
His mother shrugs while typing away. “You didn’t ask.”
I bite down on my tongue to stop myself from laughing.I’m positive Julian would rather die than ask anyone for help, including his mother. It’s a chronic condition he inherited from his late father.
I grab my purse from my mom’s hand and give her and Josefina each a kiss on the cheek before heading over to Julian’s car. It resembles a spaceship with all the sharp lines and chrome detailing, and I’m sure it flies like one too when given a little gas.
I have a hard time processing how the guy who considered buying a new video game a luxury became the billionaire in front of me who owns an electric blue McLaren. My mom swears Julian has never let money get to his head, but I bet he struggles with an insufferable ego and a god complex.
While I had huge success with my interior design company and home renovation show, Julian struck gold after he helped his genius cousin and computer coder Rafa create Dwelling, the most popular real estate search engine around, at the ages of twenty-three and twenty-five, respectively.
The idea might have started out as another one of Rafa’s crazy, unsuccessful attempts at creating the next best app, but then it evolved into a billion-dollar company with investors, a board of directors, and the Lopez cousins securing a spot on the covetedForbes30 Under 30 List.
Julian and I reach for the passenger door. His hand brushes across the back of mine, and a spark of recognition flares to life.
The smell of his cologne—clean and expensive—invades my nose. It twitches before a sneeze shoots out of me. I jolt, andmy butt brushes against Julian’s front.
Oh God.
He yanks the door open. “Salud.”
“What a gentleman,” I reply in a dry voice.
His grip on the door tightens until his golden skin turns white. “Can’t have your mother thinking I’m anything but chivalrous.”
“No need to try so hard. She thinks you’re the first person since Jesus to walk on water.”
