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“Why did you say that we’re more alike, do you and Jorge have issues?”
“The same thing he would do to me. He would make me feel as if I’m stupid, as if I wasn’t worth the air he breathes, but only in private. Never in public. Everyone thinks of him as an angel, but he’s far from it. When he left, I didn’t feel the need to have to prove anything to anyone anymore.”
Not quite true, Papá was in the background, but then without him paying visits to Jorge in the office, it became an out of sight, out of mind relationship. They worked side by side, and he would both go to every meeting, because Papá was just so damn proud of his son. Then after Jorge disappeared, he decided it would be part of his full-time job to look for his son, which turned into him mourning for him.
Either way, whatever he got up to, I didn’t see him and it made me get on with things better. I clear my throat as nightmares of my childhood flash through my eyes.
I kiss her on the forehead again as I get ready to take the car that’s waiting outside for me. I need all the strength in the world to deal with what’s going to happen now. I just hope there’s some whiskey in the limo, I’m fucking going to need it.
After a couple of shots of whiskey, my nerves calm down. I can’t believe I’m here. Take me fucking back to Japan in a hurry. My eyes are open wide as I swing open the doors to the conference room.
“What the fuck is he doing here?”
“Diego, don’t talk like that in front of me,” Abuela snaps at me, but my eyes are fixed on Papá. He can’t be bothered to come to my wedding, but he’s happily here to discuss what’s going to happen now Jorge is back.
A smirk is on Jorge’s tanned face. Dark eyes, short spikey hair, and a suit—which looks very much like my black Prada one—with a red tie and matching handkerchief.
“Is that my suit?”
He raises an eyebrow.
“Look, everyone needs to calm down. We called you here, because we know you’re only the CEO because Jorge wasn’t here. He was presumed dead,” Abuela says in one breath. I observe her stance and I must admit, Abuela doesn’t go anywhere without a full face of makeup and dressed as if she’s going to a party. Today, she’s in sweats and her roots are showing, something she said no one would ever see in her lifetime.
Yet, here she is out and about looking like this.
“He was never presumed dead. He was presumed missing and enjoying himself,” I snarl, because we’re family supposedly, so there’s no need to beat around the bush.
Lucas gives me a reassuring nod, as if memories of the past have caught up with him too. Him trying to comfort me, whenever they were ready to attack me.
“I came to make sure my son is put in his rightful place,” Papá says proudly. They share the same dark hair, same olive complexion. Everything about them is the same, even the way they’re crossing their legs. Abuela refused to let him head the company, which should have been his rightful place, if he remarried someone outside of our level, as Abuela delicately calls it. He said that he wouldn’t be controlled and married Arancha after Mamá died for love. It’s obvious by the tension between the two of them when they are together, that he didit to spite mi abuela. He has more mistresses than my fingers can count, he doesn’t even hide his affairs. Lucas thinks that Arancha stays married to him, because they signed a prenup. Arancha doesn’t get a penny if they divorce, and she loves her lifestyle, even if it means staying in a loveless marriage.
“They are both tu hijos. And don’t talk about Diego in that manner, I won’t have it,” Abuela says to Papá as I take my seat next to Lucas. Abuela is at the head of the table and Jorge and Papá are on the other side next to each other.
“How was your honeymoon, Diego? Pleasant, I hope,” Jorge says loudly. I wonder if he has lost his mind, but it is at that moment Belén walks in, and I realize no doubt he knows the truth about my bride.
My eyes dart to Lucas, who nods for confirmation, as if he knows exactly what I’m thinking.
“Yes. I enjoyed every minute of it. Especially when we secured the deal with the Japanese. So, we possess Japanese real estate.”
Abuela shakes her head in disbelief. “This is nearly unheard of. The Japanese tend to only do business with their own. Lately they’ve been doing more and more types of business with foreigners. My boy, come here.¡Darme un beso!1” she screams as she jumps from her seat as if it’s hot coal and heads over to me. I should tell her that some of it was Leticia. Belén continues to give drinks and puts food in the center of the table. She doesn’t talk nor look at anyone. We were supposed to be married, I have been away with her sister for nearly a month, and Belén’s not even giving me eye contact.
“What do you want, Jorge? I have a wife to get back to.”
My eyes are still on Belén, but there’s not a flinch as she finishes and then leaves the room. Abuela rolls her eyes. She can tell it is an attempt to have a dig at Belén, and she’s clearly not impressed.
“I want you to have a division of the company and make it your own. I will take over the rest as CEO. I don’t want us to work together. We’ve never got on.”
I shoot up. “Never got on. You make it seem as if we used to argue. You hated me. You both did.”
My fingers point at both Papá and him.
“You stole the one woman I loved. She could have been with me today if it wasn’t for you,” Papá says to me.
“George, you’re out of line. We’ve been over this a thousand times. Diego never killed his own mother, my daughter-in-law. We both know it wasn’t his intention,” Abuela says as she strokes my arm. But it’s too late. The same song is still being played, to make me feel guilty, and it still hits me every time.
“This is why I couldn’t attend his wedding. How can someone like him be happy, not when they …”
Before Papá can finish his last sentence, Abuela marches up to Papá and slaps him across the face.
