by Pennza, Amy
“I’m sorry,” Smith said, his gaze taking in Juan’s gesture. “Am I boring you?”
Juan glowered at his brother. “You’ve made your point. Ad nauseam.”
“This isn’t about me. It’s about Catalina, and she doesn’t want this marriage.”
“I don’t get it,” Juan bit out. “You were on board with my plan as of last night. What changed?”
Smith shrugged. “I talked to Catalina. She’s unhappy about it.” A sheepish expression crossed his face, and he muttered, “Ashley’s been against it since the beginning. I should have listened to her.”
Heaven save me from meddling women. Or at least the kind of devotion Smith seemed ensnared in. Ashley could ask for the moon, and he’d start building a fucking spaceship.
Juan made a dismissive gesture. “Ashley can only go by what you’ve told her. She doesn’t know what she’s talking about.”
A muscle ticked in Smith’s jaw. “She knows enough. Catalina isn’t a pawn you can move around however you please. She’s innocent in this.”
“Innocent?” Juan pinned Smith with a look. “You know that’s not the case, mi hermano.” My brother.
Smith didn’t back down. “She’s innocent in Rafe’s schemes.”
“I’m not so sure about that, either,” Juan said. “She’s been back and forth to Maracaibo multiple times a year since she was nineteen.”
“Yes, yes.” Smith’s tone was the audible equivalent of an eye roll. “We all know that bothers you.”
“It should bother you, too. I’ve always suspected Rafe helps her financially.”
Smith folded his arms. “So what if he does? Can you blame him? Maybe he doesn’t want to see her out on the streets.”
“Better than seeing her dead,” Juan snapped. “Which is how she’ll end up if she continues working as a prostitute.”
“She’s an escort.”
“Increíble,” Juan muttered. Incredible. He stared at his brother. “You’re a cop, Smith. You really think there’s a difference?”
Smith cleared his throat, obviously less than comfortable with the subject. But his face took on a stubborn look Juan recognized. “You know I don’t like it,” he said quietly. “And I’d rather she flip burgers than participate in that life. But from what I know, Catalina is extremely careful—and she’s selective about her clients. I hardly think the CEOs of San Antonio’s largest corporations pose a danger. Besides, if you’re so worried about her safety, you probably shouldn’t have had her evicted.”
“Ahhh, this again.” Juan looked at the ceiling.
“I know you prefer I forget about it,” Smith said. “Or at least see it your way. But I can’t do that.”
Juan dropped his gaze back down. “It was one time, and I didn’t have her evicted. I contacted her landlord.”
“Semantics.”
They weren’t going to get anywhere with this argument. Juan tried another approach. “I’m not the enemy here, Smith.”
“Neither is Catalina.”
“Then we agree.” Juan brushed the sides of his suit jacket back and rested his hands on his hips. “We have an opportunity to shut down the entire Salvatierra drug empire. Given Catalina’s relationship with Rafe, I need to make sure she can’t have any contact with him.”
Smith held his gaze, obviously thinking it over.
Juan used the opportunity to push his point. “Put yourself in Rafe’s shoes. Once he finds out what Arturo did, he’ll do whatever he can to get to Catalina.”
Smith’s voice was steady. “You think he’ll try to strike a deal.”
“I do.”
“But this marriage—”
“Is an insurance policy. It keeps her by my side, and it keeps her out of trouble.”
Smith’s hazel eyes—so like his own—grew laser-focused. Intense.
The hairs on Juan’s nape lifted. Smith was a changed man since Ashley came into his life. She softened his rough edges. But there was no erasing who he was underneath. At his core, Smith was a Green Beret. In the past, his life had hinged on his ability to quickly read people and decide if they were lying.
Juan resisted the urge to fidget, which was…a damned unpleasant development.
Finally, Smith spoke. “What happened between you and Catalina?”
Juan’s heart thudded, and heat crept up his neck. When people lied or contemplated being dishonest, they often looked left. He forced himself to hold Smith’s gaze. “What do you mean?”
“You didn’t speak at Mom’s funeral. You wouldn’t even sit near each other.”
Well, this was a tightrope of a conversation. Juan tried for nonchalance. “I made it clear she wasn’t welcome unless she changed her lifestyle. When she didn’t, I was less than pleased to see her there.”
Smith gave him another dose of long, uncomfortable scrutiny before saying, “I still don’t understand the need for a marriage.”
Juan went to the window, where he could release the breath he’d been holding without Smith noticing. People bustled about on the street below. Many carried a coffee cup in one hand and a cell phone in the other.
Behind him, Smith sighed. “Can’t you accomplish what you need to without an arranged marriage? That’s the part Catalina is objecting to.”
“Perhaps,” Juan murmured, his gaze on the street. “But a marriage gives me a claim over the money. It’s an incentive for her to uphold her end of the bargain.” A flash of white caught his eye. He leaned forward.
What the…? But he already knew.
Ashley and Catalina had emerged from the office building—only Catalina had exchanged her black cocktail dress for a sleek white concoction with a delicate lace overlay. The color set off her tan skin, and the short length emphasized her impossibly long legs. Her toned calves flexed as she grabbed Ashley’s hand and jogged across the street, her dark hair bouncing against her lace-covered back.
Jogging. In stilettos—a white pair this time. More than one man did a double take as the pair of beauties darted through traffic.
They made it across the street and disappeared into a drugstore with a large red and white sign.
A drugstore with a phone.
“Shit.” Juan spun from the window and headed for the door.
“What is it?” Smith fell in behind him.
Juan spoke without turning around. “Your wife just led Catalina across the street.” Although from the looks of it, Catalina had been the one doing the leading. Smith on his heels, Juan strode through the office and down a short hallway that led to a set of service stairs with a steel door. He swung it open, letting it bounce off the wall as he hurried down the concrete steps.
“What’s the big deal?” Smith asked, matching Juan’s pace with ease.
Juan glanced at Smith as they rounded the second-floor landing. “You didn’t give her the help she wanted. Guess which Salvatierra brother she’ll try next.”
Understanding lit Smith’s gaze. He knew how quickly Rafe moved—and how furious he was going to be when he found out Arturo disinherited him. His tentacles spread throughout South America and all the way north, into the US and Canada. One phone call from Catalina would start the wheels of retribution turning.
Juan’s heart pounded as he hit the door leading to the outside. Bright sunlight assaulted him, and he threw up a hand as he glanced in either direction and crossed the street with Smith at his side.
The drugstore clerk gaped at them as they entered. Juan stopped and searched the front of the store. Row after row of shelves impeded his view. He looked at the clerk, who held a small bundle of roses wrapped in plastic.
“Two young women just came in here, one in a white dress.”
The clerk, a middle-aged man with thick glasses and a mustache to match, nodded. “Yes,” he said in accented English. He leaned sideways and pointed. “Down there.”
Juan walked past the ends of aisles loaded with an assortment of summer items—cheap inflatable pool toys and tubes of sunscreen. As he passed
a display of bottled water, Catalina and Ashley came around the corner.
Catalina stopped in her tracks, her face startled. She tucked her hand just behind her thigh. “Juan.” She looked past him. “Smith?”
Ashley frowned and looked at her husband. “What’s going on?”
He took her arm in a gentle grip and tugged her aside, murmuring, “I’ll explain in a minute.”
Juan kept his gaze on Catalina. “You tell me.”
Anger stirred in her eyes, but her tone was sarcastic. “We’re in a drugstore.”
“I can see that. Make any phone calls?”
“What?” For a split second, confusion reigned in her gaze. It was quick, but it was enough to tell him she hadn’t tried to contact Rafe.
Still, there was something suspicious about her. He glanced down. “What’s that you’re hiding?”
Now the anger flamed into full force. “Which do you want me to answer first?” she asked, her voice rising. “Do you want to know if I called anyone? Or should I give you my shopping list?”
An older man pushing a small shopping cart passed the end of their aisle, his expression a mix of curiosity and concern. The wheels squeaked as he rolled past, then stopped once he was out of view.
Juan gritted his teeth. “Just tell me what you’re holding.”
She thrust a small box at him. “Here.”
Reflexes kicked in, and he grabbed it before she could drop it. The rattle of pills was unmistakable. He lifted his head.
“Why didn’t you just say you have a headache? I’ve got stuff back in the office.”
The look she gave him could have incinerated him on the spot. “Maybe I was worried about my new husband poisoning me for my money.” She whirled and headed for the front of the store.
Without thinking, he reached for her.
Faster than he could track, she dipped her shoulder, slipping his grasp. Then she spun, her eyes blazing. “Grab me again, Juan, and you’ll be the one who needs painkillers.” She glanced at Smith and Ashley, who wore identical surprised expressions. “I’m going back to the office,” she said, then turned and kept going.
Juan stared after her. What the hell was that? She’d moved like water—her body fluid and graceful. Juan looked at the box in his hand, his thoughts churning.
Smith cleared his throat. “Ash and I will head back. We’ll talk to her.”
“Yes,” Juan murmured, still looking in the direction Catalina had gone. “Have Emily bring my car around, would you? I don’t want to keep the magistrate waiting.”
Smith’s low, soothing voice mingled with Ashley’s higher, more agitated one as they left the store. The words “ridiculous” and “marriage” drifted back to Juan as they made their way to the exit.
Marriage. What was it Smith had said? “Can’t you accomplish what you need to without an arranged marriage?” Juan tightened his grip around the box, making the pills inside shift. He hadn’t lied to Smith when he called the marriage an insurance policy. As Catalina’s husband, he’d have a claim over any property she inherited. But it was complicated. Arturo’s will gave everything to Catalina, which meant she could make an argument that the money was hers alone—separate property, they called it under the law. On the other hand, he was Arturo’s son, and that might carry some weight in court.
As far as legal arguments went, it was relatively weak. But that wasn’t his only reason for insisting on the marriage. Catalina’s “profession” had been a thorn in his side for years. It was the sort of thing his enemies would love to dig up and exploit. He’d built himself a nice little empire. One rumor, one story, about his escort foster sister, and the whole thing could come crashing down.
So, yeah, he was within his goddamn rights to put a stop to it. Getting her fired from that “gentleman’s club” when she was twenty hadn’t worked. Calling her landlord when she put up her escort website hadn’t worked, either.
As she demonstrated just now, Catalina had a way of sliding out of every roadblock he threw in front of her. Like Rafe, she seemed determined to drag him back into the muck of crime and violence. The only difference between them was their methods.
Not the only difference, a little voice whispered.
“Cállate,” he said under his breath. Shut up.
Wheels squeaked, and the old man with the cart emerged from the next aisle, his expression cautious.
Juan scowled and headed for the front of the store. This is what Catalina had reduced him to: arguing with himself in the middle of the painkiller aisle.
At the counter, he plopped the pills next to register and nodded at the clerk. “I’ll take this.”
The man peered at him over his glasses as he scanned the box and put it in a shopping bag. “You’re with the bella chica?”
Juan nodded. “Sí.” Catalina was, indeed, a beautiful girl.
Disappointment tinged the man’s face, and he touched the plastic-wrapped bouquet on the counter. “She forgot her flowers,” he said in Spanish.
Juan looked at the roses. They were the small, tightly budded blooms men bought for their wives or girlfriends as a last-minute gift on Valentine’s Day. He gestured to the bouquet. “She wanted these?” he asked in the same language. “The woman in the white dress?”
“Sí, bueno.” The man pushed his glasses higher on his face. “She said today is her wedding day,” he said, his Spanish flavored with the flatter, more nasal sounds of Mexico. He smiled. “It’s a lucky man who marries that one, eh?”
“Yes,” Juan said absently, his gaze on the flowers. A lucky man. She was going to buy flowers… His anger faded, replaced with an emotion he couldn’t quite identify. Whatever it was, it seemed to expand his chest and rise into his throat. He swallowed.
“Señor?”
The clerk’s voice pulled Juan from his thoughts, and he gestured to the flowers. “I’ll take those, too.”
Behind him, squeaking wheels signaled the approach of the older shopper.
The clerk switched to English. “All right.” He added the flowers to the bag, angling them carefully to one side. He handed the bag to Juan with a smile. “Tell the lady best wishes for her special day.”
Juan nodded. “I will.”
On his way out the door, the strange pressure in his chest pushed against his sternum. It was almost like a burn…or an ache.
Or maybe something like regret.
6
This is taking forever.
Catalina sat straighter, stretching her spine to its full length and releasing a pent-up breath. The courthouse bench offered nothing in the way of comfort. Instead of relief, she was rewarded with the bench’s hard, unforgiving backrest digging into her shoulder blades.
Next to her, Smith offered a sympathetic smile. “Backache?”
“You could say that,” she muttered.
He settled an arm along the backrest’s rounded edge, seemingly at ease in the cavernous hallway outside the magistrate’s office. “Unfortunately, the courthouse didn’t factor in comfort when it decorated.”
On Smith’s other side, Ashley perked up. “I just don’t get why they made all the seating look like church pews.”
Catalina gazed down the long line of wooden benches that hugged the marble wall. Huh. They did look like pews.
Smith chuckled and brushed a curl off Ashley’s shoulder. “Well, darlin’, I imagine a lot of people in this place spend time praying.”
Wasn’t that the truth. Over the past forty-five minutes, she’d considered sending up a few prayers of her own. Maybe something along the lines of, “Please, God, let a meteor hit so Juan is forced to call off this marriage.”
Except she wasn’t so sure a meteor would stop Juan from insisting on going through with this. He’d been quiet—his expression resolute—when he returned from the drugstore. Apart from issuing a few brief instructions to Emily and a quick stop to grab his briefcase, he was silent as they left the office and drove the few blocks to the courthouse. Inside, he pointed them
to a bench and disappeared into the magistrate’s office, saying merely, “Give me a few minutes to get the paperwork in order.”
Paperwork. That’s how he thought of locking her into a marriage against her will.
She looked at Smith. He was a newlywed. “Don’t you need a marriage license to get married?”
He exchanged a look with Ashley. “Yes. We had to apply a few days before the ceremony. With Smith, though…”
Ah, yes. His “connections.” Hadn’t he said the judge in charge of her criminal case was a personal friend? She snorted. “So much for justice being blind.” Juan liked to talk about how Rafe’s drug empire was a black mark against the family name, all while he rubbed elbows with judges and worked out back office deals for his clients. He hadn’t gotten where he was today by playing by the rules—at least not the kind the public knew about. He did whatever was necessary to win.
If she lost sight of that, he would roll right over her, smothering her free will in an effort to get his way. If she had any hope of making it through the next year with her sanity intact, she had to stand up to him at every turn. She had to approach this marriage—this arrangement—like a battle.
Every skirmish counted.
The magistrate’s door opened, and Juan stepped out, his eyes landing on Catalina like they were guided by a laser.
“Ready?”
Not even a little bit.
She stood and put her shoulders back. “Of course.” She smiled and raised her voice enough to carry down the hall. “It’s not every day you marry your own brother.”
Juan’s expression darkened, and his mouth compressed.
Perfecto. She crossed the hall, Ashley’s too-small heels pinching her toes with every step.
As she passed Juan, he caught her arm and put his mouth next to her ear. “No more of that, if you please, Catalina.”
She looked up, their gazes inches apart. She matched his volume. “Why not, Juan? Worried I’ll embarrass you? Maybe you should have thought of that before you dragged me here for this farce of a marriage.”
His voice was soft, but the determination in his eyes was unmistakable. “Farce or not, we’re going through with it. Later, you can give me hell. Right now, I need you to behave yourself. Claro?”
