The day started as usual, with me being summoned to my in-laws' house because my husband had caused yet another scandal by failing to avoid cameras when he was sucking his new girlfriend's face. Now I had to go and fix it.
At first, I wasn't too worried about it. I had been doing this for almost seven years now, so nothing really surprised me anymore, but today did.
"Heir of Rivera industry caught in another scandal?" I read out loud as I scrolled through the article and the low-quality pictures of my husband and a woman whom I thought I recognized.
"Can you read that any louder?" Luke Rivera, my husband, groaned beside me. We were in the backseat of his latest fancy car. He was very clearly hungover from last night. With his head on his hands, he barked orders at the driver. "Slower, Finley!"
Finley, our middle-aged driver, nodded before slightly glancing at me and I shook my head. He understood and kept on driving at the same speed.
"We need to get to your family house in ten minutes. If we slow down now, you will have to hear more yelling in that hangover," I coolly said while getting back on my phone.
I already had countless messages from the PR team of the Rivera industry. Most were angry messages and some were outright ordering me to go to the company office right now and talk strategy about how to fix this mess. All I texted back was, "On the way to meet Luke's parents and grandfather." And everything went silent after that. Nobody texted back. Everyone was scared of Clement Rivera, the founder of the Rivera Industry, a man known for his temper, and Luke's Grandfather.
"Yeah, as if they care when we arrive," Luke said rolling his eyes. "And if this was that important you could have gone on your own. Why drag me so early in the morning?"
"You do realize we are going to meet your family because you f*cked up . . . again, right?" I tried very hard to control my emotions and fortunately, my voice remained even. I would never show this man that he got under my skin in any capacity. "Because you got caught in cameras kissing another woman."
"It was Tiffany," Luke snapped at me defensively as if that was going to make all of this better. It didn't. In fact, it made things worse.
"Tiffany Adler?" I blinked in confusion. Was he really that stupid? "You are sleeping with Tiffany Adler?"
"Yes. What about it? You got a problem with that?" He shouted and I could feel his anger rising. His anger was the only thing he got from his grandfather.
I massaged my temple in frustration.
"Tiffany Adler is a model and the talk of the town most of the time," I said slowly trying and failing to keep my voice from rising. "People even noticed when she went missing from last night's Organza. Now add them with the pictures that are leaked. Do you really believe people wouldn't put two and two together? Do you not realize how big of a mess this is for you?"
"I will be fine. This will blow over," Luke said nonchalantly.
"Luke, seriously –"
"And if you are so worried about it, fix it yourself, why don't you? I mean if you are competent enough, or you know, if you are capable to do something other than eating all the time," Luke laughed out loud at his joke and I fell silent realizing how talking to him would always be a waste of time.
But of course, he wasn't done.
"Just so you know, if you are jealous of her, don't be. You can never compete with her. Tiffany and you have nothing in common, fortunately. The things she can do in bed, my god, and I know I don't have to tell you how hot she is." Luke eyed me from head to toe, making my skin crawl. "You should know you are nothing compared to her in any way."
He chuckled cruelly glancing at my thighs, which made me clench my hand in a fist but I tried to ignore him.
"Have you even started going to the gym? What do you do anyway sitting on your *ss all day?" Luke said reproachfully as if he was disgusted by the sight of me.
I turned my face away from him and looked out of the window, and he didn't like that.
"Did you just ignore me? Listen here you, f*cking bi–" He was about to snap at me again when Finley honked loudly and consistently four times, making Luke livid.
"Finley! You stupid old *ss! I should get you fired! No, I will get you fired today, you f*cking moron!" Luke kept yelling holding his head in pain as the loud honking sound made the hangover worse and Finley kept apologizing profusely but I saw him giving a small sad smile in my direction. He did a good job diverting Luke's attention from me. Gratefully, I smiled back at him.
By the time, Luke finished yelling at Finley, we arrived at the Rivera family house. I climbed out of the car as gracefully as possible and walked into the house briskly. Luke trailed after me and I knew why. As soon as I entered the living room where his parents and grandfather were seated, papers were thrown into my face.
"YOU UNGRATEFUL ENTITLED USELESS BRAT! COULDN'T YOU KEEP YOUR HUSBAND TO YOURSELF FOR ONE DAY?" Clement Rivera shouted at the top of his voice.
I closed my eyes briefly from the impact of some of the papers hitting my face pretty hard, then took a deep breath and greeted him.
"Good morning, Grandfather," I bowed my head slightly out of respect.
"Good morning, MY FOOT!" Grandfather Clement seethed. "WHAT WERE YOU DOING YESTERDAY? HOW DID THIS HAPPEN?"
A question he should have asked his grandson but as always the blame was on me.
I glanced back to see Luke lingering in the doorway, he knew very well this was coming, so he stayed back for me to take the whole burn of this outburst.
"I was . . . unaware of his whereabouts yesterday after 11 pm, Grandfather," I spoke as calmly and politely as possible. "I tried to locate him but –"
"But you FAILED like an INCOMPETENT FOOL! You should be better at being a wife. If you can't do a job as simple as that, why did we take you into this family?" Grandfather Clement spat and started to pick up a magazine from the table in front of him to throw at me again but William Rivera, Luke's father stepped in.
"Father, don't you think we should talk to Luke about what he did?" Luke's father said glaring at his son.
"Yes, I will do that when he stops hiding behind his wife!" Luke's Grandfather narrowed his eyes at Luke.
Hearing his Grandfather say that he was hiding behind his wife, pissed Luke off.
"Grandpa, look, I didn't mean to cause a scandal, I was just–" Luke began stepping forward.
"You were just being careless and reckless, right?" Luke's Grandfather said grimly. His voice changed and he wasn't yelling anymore. "I told you one thing, Luke. One thing. No matter what you do, do not let your actions negatively affect our company. It is your future company. How would you fix this?"
"It's not a big deal. We can totally fix that," Luke said casually which made Grandfather more furious.
"No, we cannot, Luke. Yes, we can make the headlines disappear but we cannot recover from the losses."
"Losses that you have been causing us," Luke's father supplied.
Luke rolled his eyes at his father.
"We can make that money again, Dad."
"You ungrateful –" Luke's father began but Luke's mother chimed in.
"Do not yell at our son, Will." Sofie Rivera, Luke's mother, looked at Luke's father with disappointment before she turned to glare at me. "It's not our son's fault that he is married to a useless girl like her. We should have looked for a better girl for our kid. Then he would have been happily married, and none of this would have happened."
I remained perfectly still, pretending as if her words had no effect on me. I wished they had really found someone else for Luke, but then again, I knew him enough not to wish my faith on anyone, not even my worst enemy.
"If she was able to give him a child –" Luke's mother began looking devastated and angry simultaneously.
"Sofie, don't–" Luke's father tried to interrupt his wife but Grandfather Clement cut him off.
"No, Sofie is right. If I had decided on a different girl for him," Grandfather shook his head and again zeroed in on me. "A more competent girl, who can properly do her wifely duties without causing us this much trouble."
How was this my fault again? God, I had gone through this song and dance so many times, that I should just stop trying to find logic in their blame game. I liked to believe I almost had, but sometimes the rational part of your brain just refused to shut up. That was what happened the next moment.
When Grandfather Clement looked at me and shouted,
"Have you thought what are you going to do to compensate for your shortcomings? How are you going to fix this?"
I blurted out,
"Me?"
Big mistake.
"Yes, you useless ungrateful girl! Why do you think we are here? If you had done your job as a wife properly, we wouldn't have been in this situation." My ears burned in anger and embarrassment from the implication of his words but Luke's Grandfather continued yelling. "If you had kept your eyes on him last night, everything would have been fine."
He ultimately lost his cool again and threw the magazine at me. I closed my eyes waiting for it to hit my face hard.
But nothing happened.
Confused I snapped my eyes open and saw a hand holding the magazine in front of me just a few inches away from my face.
He was standing with his back towards me, so I couldn't see his face but I saw Grandfather looking livid and Luke's parents looked as if they had seen a ghost.
"I see you haven't changed at all, Mr. Rivera," the man said with a cool and smooth tone to Grandfather Clement.
"What the hell are you doing here?"
[To be continued]