Page 60 of Iridescent
The moment I understood what I’d done, I started torturing myself with every detail. The tension in Yara’s shoulders. The way she picked at her food and barely managed a bite. How she kept looking at me while I found every reason not to look back—because pretending to care about anything else was easier than facing my wife after everything I’d done.
???
Last night, Navarro Estate.
A hush settles over the dining room, broken only by the slam of the double doors as my wife walks out.
My heart plummets. I stand there a second too long, guilt and panic clamping around my throat hard enough to leave me damn near useless.
Go after her.
She knows I lied.
Move, you fucking idiot.
I force my legs to move.
“Xavier.”
My mother’s voice knifes across the room. Every instinct in me screams to ignore her, go after my wife, make sure she is okay. But one word from Mamá still has the power to stop me in my tracks.
I turn toward the head of the table, jaw locked so tight it aches. My mother lifts one perfect brow and dabs at her red lipstick with a linen napkin. “Sit down.”
Heat flares behind my eyes. “What did you just say?”
She sets her napkin beside her plate with that same infuriating composure and meets my gaze with a placid smile, as if my wife has not just walked outbecause of her. “I said let her go. If that is all it takes to send her running, then perhaps she never belonged here to begin with.”
Anger licks up my spine. I should walk out. Ignore her. Every second I waste here is another second my wife is alone, hurting. But I know that look. She is not finished.
“Careful, Mamá.”
Conversation falters. A few heads turn. Whispers break loose and die just as quickly. No one here has ever heard me speak to my mother that way. Not once. Not even when I should have, years ago.
But this is Yara. My wife. I have already let this go too far. That ends now.
“You are one sentence away from making a mistake you won’t recover from.”
Her brown eyes narrow a fraction. “Why? Because I mentioned Isabel? Or because your wife is so fragile she cannot bear being reminded that another woman could give you everything she cannot?”
Rage hits so hard it burns straight through reason.
Isabel shifts beside my mother, lifting a hand as if to stop her, but Mamá keeps going.
“Look at what that girl has reduced you to. Snapping at your own mother over a little reminder of reality.”
“Reality?” I brace my palms on the table and lean forward. “Then let’s talk about reality. You want to bring up Isabel? Fine. Tell them why the whole city was so obsessed with Xavier Navarro and Isabela Ortega. Tell them how I ended up with her in the first place.”
Unease ripples through the table. My mother’s smile tightens.
“Don’t,” she warns, and for the first time her mask slips.
“Why not? Ashamed of the truth? Fine. I’ll say it. I was with Isabel because you and everyone else in this room made damn sure I believed I had no choice. You decided a long time ago that the only woman I should want was the one you chose for me. You pushed her into my life and pushed me into hers, and now you have the nerve to sit there and—”
“¡Basta! Enough.”
My father’s voice cracks across the table and cuts me off. His face is flushedwith fury. “You will not disrespect your mother.”
I turn to him. Alejandro Navarro. Head of this family. A man who has never let me forget my place. He sat through my mother’s tirade in silence, but now his hand tightens around his wine glass as if he would rather have his fingers around my throat.
