Mariano poured scotch into a tumbler and handed it to the woman sitting so forlornly on his couch. He'd been waiting outside as the nurse escorted her from the room so the doctor could attend to her husband. In a daze, she allowed herself to be guided into his office, mentally stuck in the argument she had with Maximo. Not only had it yielded no results, but with the dirty revelations it came with, it only worsened matters.
She accepted the glass without looking and took a big drink. Then she coughed. "That's horrible!"
Mariano sipped his own scotch, enjoying the notes of caramel and oak as it slid down his throat. The thirty-year-old single malt was perfect. And so was her performance. She definitely knew how to play the innocent.
His mouth twisted in disdain as he thought back to the first time he set his sights on her, and then the morning after what he'd believed to be the best night of his life. Yes, she was a virgin, but no one warned that gold-diggers came in virginal packages nowadays. That morning, he knew she was marrying some older man for his wealth. And today he found that since he'd freed her of the burden of being a virgin, she'd been very generous to other men.
He didn't have the full details but he clearly heard Maximo call her a whore. The whole house did. Then he'd gone ahead to accuse her of infidelity during the course of their marriage. He didn't hear her denying or refuting any of those allegations but she'd been dazed. Probably surprised that Maximo found her out.
That was laughable. Didn't she know the kind of man she was married to? The kind of men she'd surrounded herself with? At this point, he was beginning to wonder if she knew what she'd gotten herself into.
He followed her movements as she plunked the tumbler on the table. She hadn't once tried to fix her hair or asked to see a mirror so she could primp and preen. It was almost as if she was unaware of her beauty. He couldn't deny that it was the same cluelessness that had spiked his interest the very first night he saw her.
As he watched, she reached into one of the pockets of her very stylish coat and pulled out a pair of glasses. Then she glanced up at him and sighed. "We need to talk."
"That's why you're here." he pointed out. "Since when do you use those?"
She shrugged as she adjusted her glasses on the bridge of her nose. "Almost all my life. I can see pretty well without them, but I get headaches if I go too long." She dropped her gaze to her lap and sighed again. "Your surname is Barrera," she said numbly.
"Yes, it is," he replied. He did not doubt that she knew exactly who he was when she'd seduced him, snaked her way into his bed, and given herself to him. She'd after all been engaged to his father for christ's sake! Maximo would have said something. And if he hadn't, someone else would've. Be it the domestic staff, his younger sister, who he'd gathered didn't like Aurora very much, or anyone from their circle of friends. It's impossible that she knew nothing about him.
"Then explain to me why Maximo tells me you're his son."
"Because I am." he shrugged. Then added, "Unfortunately."
"How?!" she demanded, voice shrill as desperation ran through her like a live wire. "Your name is Mariano Barrera! Not Khomeini. If I had the right government name, I wouldn't have...wouldn't have...." she struggled for words.
"Slept with me?" he proffered.
"Yes!"
"I see." he took another gulp of his drink. "That's a shame."
He would play her game. For now.
She took another swig of scotch, coughed, and set it aside again. If she was acting, she was doing a fine job of it.
"Why didn't you say something? Why did you change your name? Did... did you know who I was when.... "
"I don't see how my change of name is any of your business." he interrupted. "I didn't go to bed with you knowing you belonged to someone else, let alone Maximo." The twinge of feeling he got when he thought of this woman with his father angered him. "I wouldn't even touch you with a ten-foot pole if I did. If that's all the questions you have, then we should move on to more pressing issues. Matters like why you're here, what's going on, and information on the men who invaded your home. That conversation is more important than whatever troubles you're currently experiencing in paradise."
Expression crumpling, she clasped both hands in her lap, her knuckles whitening. "Fine. Pray tell, what's going on? What has Maximo gotten us into?"
"A lot. One would assume that a man in his line of business would know better than to piss off the wrong people. But then again, Maximo's a brute who never knew loyalty, respect, discipline...." he trailed off smoothly. "He's a thief. And it takes a woman of like character to remain married to a man like that for five years."
She blinked, missing the insult as she tried to reconcile the man he'd just described to the one she'd been tied to over the last five years. If one thought deeply about everything that had transpired between them, it was clear Mariano had put a name to every bad attitude Maximo had exhibited since he discovered her infidelity. Especially the 'thief' part. How could she ever get over the loss of her child? A baby he'd taken from her barely twenty-four hours after she'd gone through the knife to have it.
"Yes." Her eyes were huge and liquid. "He's all that and more. The very worst. So what else has he stolen this time?"
Mariano's steely cold gaze pierced her. She'd just confirmed that his assumptions had been right all along. She'd known the kind of man she got hitched with, yet still went ahead with the morbid affair. The scheming shank was nothing but a cheap pretentious harlot!
"What?" she asked, noting the look he'd given her. He looked angry.
He looked away. "Maximo stole trillions from the leaders of five mafia cartels. But before that, he poisoned them all. Three are dead, one got to the antidote on time, and the other is stuck somewhere between living and dead. The cartels want blood.... and their money back."
Her eyes widened as he spoke. She found it was impossible to understand what she was hearing. Maximo stole. Maximo killed three people and another one was currently fighting for his life. He was a killer. This killer had her son. Her head shook, her jaw fell slightly opened and she paled.
"You are quite good at this," Mariano murmured, invading her thoughts.
She blinked up at him. "I'm-- I'm sorry?"
He got to his feet and went over to a cabinet close by, returned with a glass, and thrust it toward her. Aurora held up her hand as her stomach rebelled. "Not again—"
"It is water."
She took the glass and drank, thankful because her mouth had suddenly gone dry with all that news. It was clear she had no idea who she'd been married to. Her head felt light, and her heart thundered in her chest. "I-- I need to leave," she murmured to herself. "I'll get my sister and together we'll go look for--"
"The cops would be of no use to you." her gaze drifted to his. "And as for your sister," he took his phone from his jacket and flashed her the screen. "I'm afraid they have her in custody."
Aurora felt her heart skip a painful beat. She reached for the device to get a better look at the brunette in handcuffs and what appeared to be a broken, bloody nose. It was her kid sister, alright.
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