“Okay.”
I gape in mild horror as my brilliant sister rises like a Stepford Wife and heads to a kitchen she’s never been to in search of a wine bottle she hasn’t seen.
Mia pushes back her chair, shaking her head at Rafe. “Use your powers for good, not evil.”
“I am,” he objects, innocently.
Mia shakes her head again and heads for the kitchen to help Laurel find the wine.
Mateo waits until his wife is out of sight to grin at Rafe. “I’m so glad you could make it, Rafe.”
Chapter Twenty Eight
Vince
Operation keep Vince away from Mia has been abandoned.
My partner has jumped ship.
I sort of get why, though. Rafe toyed with Laurel all through dinner, and Laurel put up about as much resistance as a bachelor fending off a free lap dance. Laurel is all smiles, all night long. Instead of returning to our bedroom after dinner, Rafe tells Laurel he wants to go for a swim, tells her to join him.
I know what that bastard gets up to in pools, so even if Carly didn’t insist on going with them, I would have.
“Can we go, too?” Mia asks Mateo.
And that’s how the triple date from Hell begins.
It’s too cold to go outside, but the indoor pool is heated and maintained year-round. Laurel and Carly don’t have swimsuits, but Mia assures them both she has several she’s never even taken the tag off of and she whisks them away to her walk-in closet.
“What’s your game?” I ask Rafe, as soon as they’re gone.
“Blackjack,” he deadpans.
“Why are you paying attention to Laurel?” I nod at Mateo. “Did you do this? Why?”
Mateo shrugs. “Free entertainment? Live a little, Vince.”
“I live plenty. I don’t mess with people to have fun.”
“He’s so boring,” Mateo tells Rafe.
Rafe smirks, walking over to the poolside alcohol cart and pouring himself a drink.
The girls come back, all three of them in barely there bikinis. Of course. Why would Mateo buy Mia a bikini that covered anything up? Apparently she’s pregnant again, but it must be early because I sure can’t tell. Her body looks the way it looked to me back when I used to sleep with it curled up beside me in bed.
Fuck, that is a tiny bikini.
Now her tiny bikini-clad body sways over to Mateo. She wraps her arms around his neck and he slides his hands under her ass, lifting her up. Her legs lock around his waist and she kisses him like they’re on their fucking honeymoon.
This already sucks ass.
Instead of doing anything remotely like that, my own hot girlfriend is hovering over Laurel, trying to keep her away from my other predatory cousin. The problem is, Laurel is not remotely interested in her protection. As soon as Rafe takes his shirt off, Laurel’s scientific brain seems to shut down. When he gives her an intimate smile and crooks his finger at her, she abandons Carly and goes to the hot tub with Rafe.
Carly comes over and grabs my arm, dragging me along with her.
The only good thing about the hot tub is that apparently Mia can’t get in it, so she and Mateo stay in the pool and play by themselves. The bad thing about that is Carly is singularly focused on babysitting her sister so she’s not paying any attention to me. My gaze automatically keeps drifting to Mia and Mateo. It’s shitty watching him corner her in the pool, watching her smile up at him like he hung the moon. Then he kisses her until I’m not entirely sure they’re not fucking. I didn’t see anyone remove bottoms, but she’s so fucking enraptured as he buries his face in her neck and pushes against her, I can’t be sure.
I force myself to look away. My head lolls back miserably. This is torture.
They must not have full-on fucked, because after all that foreplay, he drags her out of the pool and Mia calls, “We’ll be back!”
Rafe is smirking when I finally bring my attention back to the present company. “You all right there, bud?”
“Fucking fantastic,” I tell him, pushing up out of the water.
Carly looks up at me uncertainly.
“I’m gonna grab a drink,” I tell her.
She bites her lip, torn between following me and babysitting Laurel.
Laurel wins.
I nurse the drink for a while, looking around the pool and thinking of old times. Cherie taught me how to swim in this pool. Her methods were untraditional, but somehow effective. We were about 8, Maria must have taught her. She warmed me up by making me follow her around the edge of the pool, hanging onto the side since my feet couldn’t touch the pool floor. Cherie pushed off the edge and crossed the pool a few times, showing off all the strokes she learned. Once I witnessed her doing it, she decided that should be sufficient instruction and she told me to let go and do what she did. I told her I didn’t know how, and she said, “Sure you do, you just watched me do it.”