Chapter 4

4

I'm still literally in a bra and boy shorts, running lotion on my legs when Sky bursts through my door. "Excuse me!" I yelp.

She ignores me. "Carter's here."

"What?" I grab my phone. Nate's wedding doesn't start for almost an hour. "He's twenty minutes early! What for?"

Sky shrugs. "I don't really know Carter, so you tell me what for." She glances behind her shoulder. "Or you could just ask him yourself!"

"Teal?" Carter's voice is behind the open door. I squeal and grab the nearest piece of fabric—a pink towel, still wet from my shower—and hold it to my torso just before Sky widens the door to let him in.

"Sky!" I about scream. "I'm naked here!"

Carter makes a choked noise, but Sky just shrugs. "The towel covers all the important parts." She turns her head toward Carter, who I am assuming is still behind the door. "You want to talk to her now?"

"Wait one freaking second, the two of you!" I rush around and throw on a nightgown. It's probably too sheer to be considered decent, but it's not like anyone's giving me time to plan an elegant, conservative outfit here. I take a deep breath. "Okay. Come in."

Sky smiles and winks at me as she pushes the door open. "She's ready to see you now," she tells Carter as she leaves, sounding exactly like a professional receptionist to some fancy lawyer or something. Not like she spends her mornings running with red wolves, which I literally saw her doing just last week.

Carter appears at the doorway and my breath hitches. He's got on a navy blue suit that looks like it was tailored to his exact specifications—his wide chest, his long, lean legs. His shoes are black, shiny leather and look brand spanking new. A silk bow tie just one shade lighter blue than the suit sits at his neck. He's clean shaven, and his edges look wildly crisp, like he got his hair trimmed only yesterday. His gold eyes bore into me with an intensity that makes me feel like I've just had three shots of tequila in a row.

"Hey, Teal," he says, which snaps me out of my ogling. He's going for casual in his tone, but he sounds tense. I know him too well for him to hide that from me.

I turn my head and walk toward my dresser. Facing the mirror on it, I check that my pulling the nightgown over my head in such a chaotic rush didn't smear my makeup. "What's up, Carter?"

He clears his throat and puts his hands in his pockets. I try to act disinterested, organizing some of the makeup brushes thrown around on the top of the dresser, but finally I huff and turn his way. "What is it? What are you here to tell me, that you got cold feet? You don't want to go to the wedding with me anymore?"

The anger in me feels vivid. I cringe, waiting to hear a rumble of thunder in the distance, and breathe in relief when none comes. I'd taken an extra-long run this morning, since I woke up with my nerves feeling like they were raw, as though I'd been peeled open like a birch tree. I'd been up for at least two hours at bedtime, trying to figure out what Carter wanted from me in exchange for being my wedding date. Scenarios flitted in my brain, around and around like the craziest murmuration known to this earth.

Carter requesting a dozen handmade candles he could gift his tías and abuelas. Carter wanting me to leave the country so he wouldn't have to see me ever again. Carter gazing down at me with his wild salt lamp eyes, telling me to rob a bank on his behalf.

The stress got to me even as I slept, with thunder awakening me more than once. As soon as the skinny line of daybreak light hit my window, I'd grabbed my running shoes. I didn't stop for over an hour, and with all those hills I ran up and down I could barely walk home. Even now, my right knee aches, and my muscles feel like they're going to spasm just from me standing here, being pissed at him.

Carter's face is pink and his breath is a little too fast. He's taking too long to answer my questions. I brace myself for all the feelings—disappointment. Grief. Heartbreak. Because that's what he's about to do now, right? He's going to tell me he can't do this. He can't be friends with me ever again. I'd messed everything up to an irreparable state and now I have to deal with the consequences.

He takes two giant steps toward me, until the invisible barrier between us shatters and we're at a dangerous level of closeness. "What I need…" He clears his throat. "In order to…" He shakes his head hard. "For the favor…I mean—" He lifts his right hand, and cupped inside it is a yellow gold ring.

"Teal," he says, his voice breaking. "Sé mi esposa."

My mouth drops open and my knees give. I fall back on my bed with a thump.

Teal. Be my wife.

The room gets fuzzy. My hands tingle. I can hardly breathe.

"Teal?" Carter asks. "Are you—"

"Get out," I respond. It's the only thing I can think of to say, and I make my tone as sharp as I can, which is impressive, given my current state of shock.

He flinches. "Sorry. I did this all wrong."

"If you mean by all wrong that you asked me to marry you in the first place, then yes. All freaking wrong."

"No, I meant. I should have begun with… this is what I need. The favor, for going to the wedding with you." His cheeks are still flushed. His breath still heavy. "I couldn't—I couldn't ask it afterward. I wanted you to know what you were getting yourself into. So you could decide if you still wanted me or not."

I raise an eyebrow.

He flushes even more. "Wanted me to come with you to the wedding. Obviously."

I push my face into my hands and breathe in, one-two-three-four. Out to the count of eight. "This is really bad timing, Carter," I finally say. "I'm going to bring a thunderstorm to Nate's wedding and ruin it."

"No. You're not." He sits down next to me on the bed and I have to tighten my body so I don't fall into him as the mattress dips. He holds his hand over mine. "Let's do the breath thing together, okay?"

I know he's looking at me. He is seeing all the ways I am flawed and broken and falling apart. But then he begins counting with me—just like he used to when things were bad after Sky fell—and I stop being self-conscious. I just focus on the deep gravel of his voice, how it's almost like a lullaby. After five minutes, when I feel more like myself again, I glance out the window. It's so sunny, it looks like a postcard of a coastal Virginia summer. "Better?" he asks.

I swallow. I don't want to admit how quickly he made everything better, so I stand. "Get out. I need to get dressed. We'll talk more in the car."

The second he leaves, I take a single, shaky breath and focus all my attention on getting ready. The sweetheart neckline turquoise dress, zipped up my right side. The ylang-ylang perfume oil Sage left me when she moved out, spread on my cleavage and wrists and neck. I slip on my high heels, but after trying to stand with my legs in the state they're in, I wince and grab strappy white sandals instead. I open my purse closet—this armoire I installed shelves in—and let myself have one happy moment as I consider my collection.

It's Amá Rosa who got me hooked on handbags. She saw me admiring one of her Chanel baguettes, and the next time I saw her, she had one for me. Of course, she wasn't gracious about it at all. "Now we have to go to brunch, once a month," she'd ordered. I tried to tell her she didn't have to pay me for my time, but she wasn't having any of it. I became her favorite after Sage left. And I think after whatever she went through with my mom, she decided to keep me nearby to spoil me. So now I own three beautiful Chanels, a handful of Chloés, two Louis, and one Cartier satchel. I don't even want to know what any of them cost. I put my foot down when she tried to bring up getting me a Birkin for my twenty-fifth birthday. I told her I'd sell it, and I would've. As much as I'm obsessed with handbags, I would rather have the eighteen grand.

I don't just have luxe bags. To Amá's great disgrace, I also have embroidered bags from Mexico, and bright, crocheted bags from various department stores, and lots of handmade leather bags from small businesses all over the world. That's actually what I grab right now—a handmade crossbody from Italy, consisting of woven white leather. I transfer my wallet and phone and other essentials, and then I'm good to go.

Carter's downstairs in the kitchen, talking with Nadia over a cup of coffee. He double-takes when I walk in, but I'm slightly annoyed that he just stares right in my eyes and doesn't say a word about my dress or how I look. "You ready?"

"Yup." I walk past him and Nadia to the door, but Nadia beats me there, opening it for me.

"Beautiful weather." Nadia narrows her eyes at me. It's a warning. Don't call down a thunderstorm. Or a tornado. Don't drown my garden or destroy any homes or kill anyone, okay? I grit my teeth and make myself hum in response as I hobble out as fast as I can.

Carter rushes around me to open the car door, and once he's inside, I don't even wait till he's done buckling his seat belt.

"So." I turn toward him. "You have to be my wedding date for two hours. And in return, I have to be your wife for the rest of my life. Did I get that right?"

He blows out his hair, hollowing his cheeks as he starts the car. "Not exactly."

I wait for all of five seconds before I huff. "Carter. Any freaking day now."

He runs a hand over his hair. It's too short to stick up or anything, but he still feels rumpled. "It's my abuela Erika. You remember her?"

I snort. "The abuela who accused me of being a loose woman out to ruin her precious, perfect grandson when I first met her at the age of eleven? How could I forget such a lady?"

Nothing I'd said was an exaggeration. Crochety old Erika had taken one look at me and decided I was no good for Carter. To this day, I haven't the faintest idea as to why. Maybe it was 'cause I'd just started wearing a training bra, and at nine, Carter was nowhere near puberty. But it's not like I looked at him—or anyone besides AJ McLean of the Backstreet Boys—like that , anyhow. And even in my raunchiest fantasies, all AJ and I did was hold hands and peck one another on the cheeks.

It was Carter's mom's birthday party, and Erika told anyone who'd listen—especially if I was in earshot—what a horrible decision his mom was making, letting him play with the likes of me. It wasn't the first time in my life I'd felt like there was something irreparably wrong with me, but it was the first time anyone had been so direct about pointing it out.

"After Eugenio died—"

I grab Carter's arm. "Abuelo Gene died? Carter, when?"

He keeps his eyes on the road. "Six months ago."

I gasp. "Why didn't you tell me?"

Carter doesn't answer at all. Instead, his jaw clenches, and a wave of something I recognize all too well flashes over his face and arms and fists. Anger.

We weren't talking six months ago. Because I kissed him and then ran into Nate Bowen's arms two nights later.

I turn toward my window, watching as the pines turn to palms the closer we get to the ocean. "I'm just saying. I wish I could've gone to his funeral."

Carter's grandfather Gene was the closest thing he'd ever had to a dad. Heck, he was the closest thing I'd ever had to a dad. Sure, he was married to Erika the nasty old brat, but every day after school, he taught me and C. how to play dominoes, and then he'd take us to the panaderia for flaky pastries filled with guava and sweet cheese. He let us sip café Cubano, even though both of our parental guardians wouldn't have approved. His parental guardian being his mother, and mine being Sage.

He's no longer in this world now. And I had no fucking clue.

I practice my breath work as he keeps going. "He was buried in Cuba." He clears his throat. "Anyway, he left me some money."

"How much money?"

When Carter tells me the amount, I whistle. "Well, congratulations. But I still don't—"

"He didn't officially leave it to me in his will. He left it to Erika to give to me. And she just told me a couple weeks ago that she's not doing it until I get married."

My jaw drops. "Is she serious?"

Carter gives a brusque nod. "As a heart attack." He huffs out a dull laugh. "That's how Gene died. A heart attack." He glances at me for the first time since mentioning it. "No pain. It happened fast." I have to deep-breathe again as Carter makes a U-turn.

Finally we pull into the parking lot of the Beachside Luxury Inn. Two towers that resemble lighthouses stand on either side of the large adobe-esque building in the middle. The roofs are done in bright Spanish tile, the color of mandarin oranges, and the walkways all around the building are set in a tile that matches the deep blue of the ocean. A distant wave of anxiety rushes low in my spine. I take another deep breath. All we're gonna do is watch Nate get married by the ocean, and then we'll go into the ballroom and dance and get drunk off our asses. That's my plan, anyhow. There is no reason to worry about any sort of unexpected, homicidal weather.

"My sisters decided they don't want kids. My cousins are all younger than us, and no one's gotten married, or is even close to it. The oldest of them are doing shit like going to college and backpacking through South America. I think Gene's death scared Erika. She thinks she's gonna go before she gets any great-grandchildren."

I turn my head slowly toward him. "What the hell are you saying? You wanna get me pregnant now, too?"

"No!" He drops his head back and closes his eyes like he's praying for strength. "I'm saying, she wants me to get married. She's requiring it of me to get my money. I'm just speculating why she's making such a big deal of this."

I sigh and glance around. To my side, there's a sliver of beach peeking between buildings. There stands Nate and his bride, and all their people, hanging around with a photographer. "They're still taking photos?" I ask.

"He's marrying a Latina." Carter glances at me from the corner of his eye. "You know how we are."

To most Latines, the time of an event is often a mere suggestion. Try telling that to Amá Sonya, though. If I arrive two minutes early to brunch, she spends the entire appetizer glaring at me while tapping at her diamond-encrusted Rolex. If I'm not there ten minutes early, I'm late.

Carter clears his throat. "You miss him?" His head inclines toward the crowd, who are now jumping, over and over again, with silky indigo bridesmaid dresses whipping in the wind, trying to get the silly shots, I guess.

He's asking about Nate. One year ago, I met him at the Lost Souls Lounge, the only real bar in Cranberry. Carter was working there. I was supposed to be spending the evening with Sage. After about five minutes, I abandoned the both of them to bang Nate at the entranceway of his downtown apartment. We then grabbed pho for a late dinner, and then I took him to Nadia's, where we screwed two more times—once on the staircase leading to my bedroom, and finally, we made it to my bed.

The truth is, I was using Nate. I realize that now. I used him to stay away from my sister, who I was still so mad at. I used him to stay away from Carter, too.

There's a reason I made that New Year's resolution list.

I'm taking too long to answer Carter's question. I can tell by how tight his arms and spine have gotten. He's not just asking if I miss Nate. He's asking if I wish I were his bride.

I sigh. "No. I don't miss Nate."

He says nothing. I can tell he doesn't believe me. What else can I say, though? If I go on and on about how Nate and I didn't mesh well, he'll think I'm protesting too much. And if I said the real reason I dumped Nate?

Well, I can't say that to him. Not now. Not ever.

"We should get our seats," I say, scrambling out of the car as fast as I can.