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He wanted to get hammered out of his mind, but he set the glass aside, too stunned to form a coherent thought. What the hell had he just heard?
His mind began to flicker with random memories that he reevaluated as they came and went. The way Sasha had reacted to Molly arriving on the yacht. The way she had stiffened once, when Rafael had asked Molly about her sister. Molly had spoken with enthusiasm and affection while Sasha had listened politely, but he had sensed something was off.
He remembered their wedding day, when there’d been a handful of strangers present, assembled to celebrate Sasha’s engagement to someone else. There’d been a man there who had watched Sasha in a way that had made her set her jaw at a defiant angle. Rafael had hated him on sight and only remembered him because he’d instinctively filed him under “enemies” in his mental register.
He remembered Sasha’s agitation when Molly’s pregnancy had been confirmed and the way she’d broken down at the twelve-week scan. He had put it all down to her fertility struggles. She was entitled to some ambivalence, he’d thought, but he hadn’t had any real idea of the things she’d been through.
He hadn’t tried to find out, either.
I didn’t feel safe telling you these things.
Talk about shame. He prided himself on looking after her well, but he hadn’t. Not in the way that counted most.
On the other hand, if she had loved him, as she had said she did, how could she lie to him about her memory loss? She had been angry with him. Fine. But she had kept it up for two months. That started to feel like the opposite of love. A grudge.
He was exhausted, but he stayed on his feet, brooding, not realizing he was waiting until he heard her stir a few hours later.
She came out of the bedroom still wearing the clothes she’d changed into when they had arrived. She faltered when she saw he was also still awake.
“They’ve landed. They’re on the way to the hospital.” She kicked into a pair of sandals and collected her purse.
He picked up the keys to drive her, not bothering to ask if she wanted him to. They didn’t speak again until he was coming out of the underground parking lot.
“My sunglasses,” she muttered as she dug through her handbag.
He pulled his own from the compartment beside his visor and handed them to her.
“Thank you.”
When they arrived, they were asked to wait in the lounge. Molly was asleep, but her mother and Libby had been allowed to step in to see her. Gio had also been relegated to the lounge. His face and clothes were lined by travel, or was that worry putting tension around his eyes?
Rafael nodded curtly. Their last two interactions had been chilly. All of their communications around their partnership were being handled by their various executive teams.
“Did, um, Patty tell—” Sasha started to ask Gio.
“She did.” He nodded once.
“He knew?” Rafael couldn’t help that his temperature immediately spiked again.
“He figured it out a few weeks ago, after visiting Patty,” Sasha said defensively.
Weeks. “Before our meeting?” Rafael directed that at Gio.
Gio hitched a shoulder.
There was no comfort in knowing that Gio could have revealed Sasha’s secrets and destroyed Rafael in twenty different ways. Instead, he had signed off the deal in good faith. Rafael ought to thank him, he supposed, but he only felt foolish that everyone seemed to have been in on the lies except him.
“I need air,” he muttered and yanked open the door.
A woman was on her way in. She faltered in surprise. She was in her fifties with threads of silver in her brunette hair. Her smile was the one that he’d seen on Molly’s face nearly every time he’d seen her.
“Hello, Rafael. I’m Patricia. Call me Patty.” She thrust out her hand and returned his firm shake.
“Nice to meet you,” he managed, but she was already dropping his hand and sweeping past him.
“Sasha,” she greeted, melting with emotion as she opened her arms to envelop his wife.
Sasha embraced her, but looked over her shoulder to the empty doorway, expression haunted. “Where’s—”
