“Babe,” he says softly. “Shit. I’m sorry. I know you were just trying to do something nice. Actually, I had planned—”
“It’s fine. I’m fine.” I wipe my face with the back of my hand. “Don’t worry about it.”
“Sienna—”
“Forget it. Really.”
The next twenty minutes are tense. I wish I could beam myself back home and forget this whole conversation, but we’re on the outskirts of Dallas, so it’s not like he can turn around and drop me off in Charming.
Lily wakes up, which breaks the godawful silence. But then she makes a weird gurgling noise, and I twist around to look at her in the backseat.
“Are you okay?”
When she vomits all over herself, I have my answer.
Ben curses and pulls off onto the access road.
“I think she got carsick.” A teary-eyed Lily and I sit on a park bench while I wipe her down.
“Should we hang out for a while? Let her stomach settle?” Ben asks, his disembodied voice coming from the back of his SUV where he’s cleaning out puke.
“Probably.” I get her out of her dirty clothes. Damn, that was the nice outfit I wanted her to wear to see Ben’s aunt and uncle. I change her into clean clothes and pat her back. She lets out a huge burp and laughs.
“Do you feel better?” I kiss her on her forehead.
She wraps her little arms around my neck and sucks her thumb as she watches kids play on a swing set.
When Ben is done cleaning the car, he takes her from my arms.
“Hey, peanut. Are you okay?” He snuggles her to his broad chest, and I melt. He’s so good with her.
It makes me miss my dad, even though he talks to me like I’m an idiot.
Like Ben did a little while ago.
I can’t shake the feeling that maybe he’s right. Maybe I don’t really know him. How can you truly know a person unless you’ve been tested?
Before my father hit it big, he probably would have sworn up and down that he’d never leave my mother. Success, like stress, tests you. Tests what you’re made of. Tests your core beliefs.
That thread of doubt leads me to a bigger question.
Like whether he and I are really compatible.
Because I do skydive. I do bungee-jump. I enjoy waterskiing tricks. I’m the first one to dive off the dock. He’s told me he likes to play it safe. It’s why he didn’t go for the draft. But now it’s sinking in what that means.
By the time we pull up to his uncle’s house, it’s getting dark, but his family’s beautiful two-story is all lit up.
I check myself in the mirror and barely contain a groan. My mascara is goopy under my eyes, which are bloodshot. Nice, Sienna.
“Why didn’t you tell me I’m a mess?” I grumble as I dig in my purse and pull out some tissues. “I look like one of those girls in a horror movie.”
“I didn’t notice anything. You always look beautiful to me.”
And then he goes and says something like that. I don’t know whether I want to beat him with my shoe or kiss him.
After I swipe under my eyes, I resign myself to looking drab because there’s no time to redo my makeup.
I unsnap Lily from her car seat so Ben can greet his family. Ben’s aunt and uncle step out onto the porch, huge smiles on their faces. They hug Ben like he’s the long-lost son. I smile as I watch them. It’s obvious they adore him.
Quietly, I walk up to them with Lily in my arms.
When his aunt sees me, she does a double-take. Her wide smile falls away and is replaced by a pinched look, like she just sucked on a lemon.
“Benjamín, you didn’t say you were bringing anyone with you. We thought it would just be you and Liliana.”
He puts his arm around my shoulders. “Tío Julio, Tía Teresa, this is Sienna, my girlfriend.”
Oh, shit. Until this moment, I hadn’t really grasped what this meant. That I would be meeting his parents, essentially. ’Cause that’s what’s happening here, right?
Cal hid me away like his dirty secret, and here’s Ben, introducing me to his family.
The fact that he wanted to bring me to something so monumental gives me hope that maybe he and I can work through this rough patch.
As I stand on the porch, nestled against Ben, I realize that despite my reservations about our relationship, if something happened to him when he skydived, I’d be devastated. If I lost him like that, I’d be the one in pieces. Because I love him. Warts and all. Not that he has many, not really. But now that we’re both so stressed, our worst sides are being amplified.
I just have to be patient. We can get through this.
Encouraged, I put everything I can into my smile. “It’s great to meet you. I’ve heard so many great things about you both.”
“Really?” Ben’s aunt says slowly as she eyeballs my outfit. And now I regret having changed into jeans and a t-shirt because Lily got puke on my sundress. “Because we haven’t heard a thing about you.”
Um.
Okay.
I glance at Ben, and the fierce scowl on his face makes me cringe. “Tía, that’s not nice. I’ve spoken to Tío about Sienna.” He kisses my temple and places his hand on my back.
She ignores his statement and reaches for Lily. “Is this my grandbaby? Ven pa ca, precíosa.”
Teresa lifts her into the air, and I put my hand on her arm to stop her. “She just got sick in the car. You’d better not—”
Too late.
I squeeze my eyes shut, horrified, when Ben’s aunt gets covered in puke.
45
BEN
I don’t have time to pull Sienna aside and make her promise to not hold anything that happens at my uncle’s house against me because I’m busy trying to calm Lily, who’s sobbing.
Not caring that she’s getting puke all over my shoulder, I pat her little butt to try to comfort her, but I’m still fuming over what Tía said to Sienna.
Coming here was a bad idea. I don’t know what I was thinking.
That’s just it. I wasn’t thinking. My uncle begged me to come, and I’ve always tried to be the dutiful son, but Teresa crossed a line just now.
I grab Sienna’s hand and reluctantly head into the house. I come up short when I see who’s in the dining room.
What the fuck?
“Janelle. What are you doing here?”
She’s sitting between her parents, dressed conservatively, like she’s about to go to church. She stands and gives me a hesitant smile. “Hi, Ben.”
Lily doesn’t even lift her head, just grabs my neck tighter and sniffles against me. The fact that our daughter doesn’t reach for Janelle speaks volumes.
“Hi, Ben? That’s all you have to say after disappearing for two months?”
Teresa, whose hair is damp from where she obviously washed out my daughter’s vomit, comes up along my side and tsks. “Mijo, be polite. Janelle and her parents want to talk to you.” She glances at Sienna. “By yourself.”
Be polite? My aunt is obnoxious to Sienna and then tells me to be polite?
Janelle’s mom runs up and starts cooing at the baby. At least one person misses Lily.