Marry the Spare, Not the Heir

Chapter 3

Diego found her an hour later, standing in the kitchen of the small guesthouse at the edge of the estate, the one she used to escape to when the main house felt too loud.

"There you are." His voice was warm, easy, the voice she had fallen in love with five years ago. "I heard you left the house. I was worried."

Camila didn't turn around right away. She kept her hands still on the counter, breathing slowly, arranging her face into something calm before she let him see it.

"I needed air," she said.

He crossed the room and pulled her into his arms before she could stop him. She let her body go rigid for only a second, then forced it to soften, the way an actress might, remembering the shape of affection without feeling any of it underneath.

"I'm so sorry about the baby," he murmured against her hair. "I should have been there. Work got out of control, but that's no excuse."

Once, those words would have undone her completely. Now she only felt the strange, distant awareness that she was watching someone perform a scene she used to believe in.

"It's fine," she said. "You're busy. I understand."

He pulled back to look at her, brushing a strand of hair from her face. "You're being very calm about this."

"What would you like me to do instead?"

Something flickered across his expression, there and gone. "I don't know. Cry. Yell at me. You've never been this quiet before."

"Maybe I'm tired of crying," she said, and it was, for once, the complete truth.

Diego studied her a moment longer, then seemed to decide her stillness was simply grief settling into something manageable. He softened again, reaching for her hand.

"Let me make it up to you," he said. "There's a gala this Friday, the Alvarado Foundation dinner. My parents will be there. I want you there too. On my arm, like always."

Camila kept her expression even. "Of course."

"I know things have been strange lately," he said. "The wedding keeps getting delayed, I know. But after Friday, I promise we'll set a real date. I mean it this time."

She almost laughed. The words landed exactly like static now, meaningless noise dressed up as a promise.

"That sounds nice," she said instead.

He smiled, pleased, mistaking her calm for reassurance instead of distance. "I have somewhere to be. I'll call you tonight."

He kissed her forehead and left, and the moment the door closed behind him, Camila's carefully arranged expression fell away completely.

She sat down at the small kitchen table, pulled out her phone, and scrolled through her contacts until she found a name she hadn't called in almost two years.

Alonso Serrano.

Her father's old friend, a man who had once offered her a position at his firm before Diego's family had gently, firmly, made it clear that a Reyes woman engaged to an Alvarado son had no business working outside the family. She had let the offer go without much thought at the time. She had thought she had everything she needed already.

She dialed the number before she could talk herself out of it.

He picked up on the third ring. "Camila? It's been a long time."

"Mr. Serrano." Her voice came out steadier than she expected. "I'm sorry to call so suddenly."

"Not at all. How are you?"

She hesitated only a moment. "Is that position still open? The one you offered me before?"

A pause on the other end, thoughtful, not surprised. "It is. Has something changed?"

Camila looked out the small kitchen window, toward the main house glowing gold in the distance, toward the life she had spent five years believing was hers.

"Everything's changed," she said. "I'd like to talk, if you have time this week."

"I'll make time," he said. "For you, always."

She thanked him and ended the call, setting the phone down gently on the table. Outside, the sun was beginning to set behind the estate's tall iron gates, and for the first time in days, Camila felt something other than grief settle into her chest.

It wasn't hope, not yet.

But it was the first quiet shape of a plan.