Never Just Friends by Katerina Winters
Chapter 5
Standing in the doorway of Mrs. DeLeon's kitchen, Victor looked out onto the packed living room. Kids, adults, and a few seniors filled the large living room of the apartment. Simply put, the DeLeon family was massive. Separated into different factions, the DeLeon were renowned in the Bronx. The family owned multiple family-owned restaurants, travel agencies, bodegas, daycares, and had tons of real estate. Growing up a few blocks away from here, Victor had known a few of the DeLeon kids growing up. He could still remember his mother pulling him aside one day after seeing him playing with a few of them and telling him to be nice to them. It was an unusual thing for his mother to say and he had stared at her in confusion that day. Normally, his mother couldn’t care less who he was friends with, much less the dynamics of his friendship. His mother was the housekeeping supervisor of a nice hotel in the upper east-side Manhattan, a position she had fought hard to get for years. The last thing she had time for was micromanaging her young son's friendships. But with the DeLeons she made the exception. Seeing his confusion, she had explained to them the far reach of the family, and while they weren't necessarily rich, they did have connections nearly everywhere—connections they were not afraid to use. Connections like uncles that made sure to give their niece an accelerated career path to detective in less than five years from starting as a rookie, he thought sourly.
Scanning the room of smiling faces, he settled back to the familiar shape in the corner. Kneeling down on the floor, Maritzia made a silly face at the two little boys playing around her. Wearing a pair of slim-fitting jeans and a yellow t-shirt and sneakers, she leaned forward and took the little race car one of the boys eagerly thrust towards her, placing it on the elaborate track she had helped them build moments before. With squealing laughter and hyper almost unintelligible words, the boys pushed the little car to race around the yellow plastic track.
A familiar longing squeezed at his chest as Victor stared at her. From the moment he had first seen her walking down the station hallway, his world seemed to stop. Although she was not overly tall, Maritzia had a way of holding herself very straight, with her shoulders back when she walked, that made her seem taller than she was. There was a strength that exuded from her that he loved and sometimes found himself envious of. At first glance, Maritzia's permanent no-nonsense expression, which reminded him a lot of their stern police chief, had a way of putting people on edge and striking a bit of fear in others. There was no role to play, no act of toughness to put on, Maritzia was just naturally strong. Only when she smiled did people get to see past her natural barrier to the quiet, if not a little bit shy, woman underneath. He loved that about her, Victor thought as he stepped forward to join her.
"Victor," Valerie called from across the room where she sat at the edge of the sofa surrounded by other members of the family sitting in various fold-out chairs.
She eagerly waved him over.
Victor stiffened for a second, looking back to Maritzia who was still fully engaged in the play session with the children, and back to Valerie where she sat with the other members of the family. Leaning on the side of the couch with a plate of food resting precariously against his forearm as he sipped his beer, Carlos met his gaze with an unreadable smirk.
Victor felt his anger towards the man resurface. Memories of his and Cade's faces laughing at him played on loop in his head. Maritzia's anger the next day when Carlos, of course, called and told her what happened still rippled out even now. The argument had been intense—very intense. Not once had they ever fought like that before. She had told him in no uncertain terms that he had no right to uninvite any of her family or friends from her apartment. Her apartment. Not theirs, but hers. Cade had been right and somehow that hurt more than the implications of her words.
Meeting Carlos's eyes directly, Victor walked over to the group. He would not back down. He loved Maritzia. When he looked at her, Victor saw everything his future could be. It would be them hosting parties at their place, it would be their kids running around with their cousins, and there would be no repeat incidents like the one from the other week. Grabbing an empty chair, Victor sat down with a smile towards Valerie and ignored the tension around him as he tried to focus on the ongoing conversation. Briefly, he wondered just how many people Carlos told about that night. Looking to where Maritzia's mother sat next to her husband, Francisco DeLeon, he thought of them knowing and suddenly felt a burning sense of embarrassment and anger. But their eyes never flickered over to him, Victor realized. Even Luis and the cousins that grew up in this four-unit apartment building, Angel, Pedro, and Robert, didn't look at him with the same snide look Carlos was no doubt still giving him.
Calming a little, Victor laughed at one of Pedro's jokes about the people at his office. No one was judging him, Victor assured himself. Soon this would be his family, and this feeling of being an outsider would fade into memory.
"Cade, mijo, come here," Mrs. DeLeon’s excited voice stole Victor’s and everyone else’s attention. Getting up from the sofa and turning to the opening front door with her arms wide, Mrs. DeLeon’s eyes sparkled at the newcomer.
Stopping in the doorway with his arms out wide in return, Cade gave the older woman a pouty face. "Mama!" he exclaimed before walking over to her and wrapping her in a strong hug.
Everyone laughed at the scene. Flushed, Mrs. DeLeon stepped away from Cade and smiled lovingly up at him.
"I went to mom's apartment and she wasn't home," Cade told her with a sad voice and a pouting face. "She abandoned me, Mama. She didn’t even tell me she was going out of town. I was standing out in the hall crying at her door all alone."
For the briefest moment, Mrs. DeLeon's eyes widened in shocked sadness before she burst out in laughter and slapped Cade playfully on his arm.
"Oh, you," she chastised and people around her laughed while Cade flashed her a wicked grin. "I know you knew; I was standing in the hallway when she called and told you."
"But it was the reality knowing my mom was really gone that made me so sad," he said, trying to give her another pouty face, but unable to hold back the grin.
Poking him in the ribs, Mrs. DeLeon told him she would go get him a plate of food just as Francisco DeLeon embraced him in a brief fatherly hug.
Victor felt the back of his neck grow hot at the sight of the asshole. Everyone in the room turned to greet Cade like plants leaning towards the sun. Built like a goddamn linebacker, Cade was admittedly a good-looking man. With his dimpled face and square jaw, the man had a pretty boy look on top of a jacked body wrapped inside a ridiculous shirt that was three sizes too small. The guy looked like a fucking bad joke.
Giving out brief hugs, waving and smiling Cade slowly made his way through the crowded room. Briefly, the man's dark eyes settled onto his, and Victor had to stop himself from visibly stiffening. The warmth that had been there for everyone else immediately dissipated from the man's eyes, replaced by a flash of hostility before disappearing completely as he acknowledged Valerie and her brother beside him.
Helpless to stop him, Victor watched as Cade worked his way to the back of the apartment to the destination they all knew he was going. Looking over his shoulder, Victor glanced at Maritzia, sitting on the floor with her legs spread out and surrounded by toys as she looked up to her partner. The smile she gave him made Victor want to run over there and snatch her away from him.
Turning away from the scene, Victor stood, ignoring the looks of the people sitting around him. With a forced smile, he made an excuse to grab another drink and asked if anybody else wanted one. Thankfully no one took him up on his offer, and Victor turned to go into the kitchen. Standing at the kitchen counter and next to the refrigerator, partially hidden from the view of others, Victor looked out through the open bar counter and watched as Cade knelt down beside Maritzia on the floor.
Cade wanted her. He always had; Victor was sure of it. From the moment he arrived back in New York, Cade had wanted Maritzia. Unlike everyone else, Victor wasn't blind. He could see the regret in the man's eyes whenever he looked at her. He could feel Cade's hatred for him each and every time she walked into his arms and not Cade’s. At first, Victor found the bastard's secret crush slightly amusing if not a little pathetic. Victor would always feel sorry for Bethany as Cade stared off at Maritzia with longing and regret, while she sat there looking the fool. Cade was a man permanently stuck in the friend zone by his own actions and Victor relished in it. Once he had even loved Cade's jealousy, relished in it. But now it was all crumbling down around him. Bethany was gone. Victor could feel Cade encroaching on his territory and it sent a wave of panic down his spine like he had never felt before.
He was no match for Cade. The grim cold truth made Victor feel sick to acknowledge it, but there it was. Cade with his fucking looks, his more than established connection with the family—and worst of all, Maritzia's love.
Sometimes Victor wished she had never confessed that secret to him. It had been the first year when he moved in with her. They had been drinking wine coolers and hanging out on the rooftop terrace all night, laughing and sharing childhood memories. A little tipsy, she had confessed that Cade, her best friend, and almost brother, had been her first real crush and how she had been devastated when he left for the army.
She had said she didn’t love him like that anymore.
But as he stared at them now as they played with the group of excited kids, he noted the way her face shined under his goddamn light and knew she was lying. That smile was all the proof he needed. Victor hadn't seen a smile like that directed at him in what felt like months. All he had gotten from her were wary looks and ignored calls.
Slowly, day by day, Cade was coming to terms with what he wanted. Victor could see it. The man was like a silent stalking lion edging in closer and closer, its hunger for its prey growing stronger. Fear made Victor's insides grow cold while his pride inflamed his skin, images of everything he worked so hard to obtain disappearing flitting through his head uncontrollably.
Bracing his hands on the counter, Victor pulled his gaze away from the two and stared down at the granite countertop, losing himself in the shining pattern.
He would not let Cade have her. He would not let him win.