He knew a lot about her experiences of travelling around with her mother but nothing at all about her life here, when she had finally returned to her home town.
He had guessed, shrewdly, at her experiences of being a nanny and working for James, but she had wisely held back from saying anything that could jeopardise the job which she badly needed, at least for the time being.
She had become close enough to want him in a very, very physical way, but had remained distant enough to protect herself, conscious of the temporary nature of his visit and the unsuitability of his personality.
‘Hi.’ She smiled and stared up at him, uneasily aware that he wasn’t smiling back with his usual easy charm. ‘I wondered whether you’d become lost in the city!’ She chatted away, keeping some distance between them and wishing she had covered herself a little more, because the unreadable remoteness of his expression was making her feel vulnerable and exposed.
‘Is it possible to become lost anywhere in the world if you’re in possession of a smart phone?’ he murmured.
‘So true.’ The smile was still there. ‘Have you brought lunch? I’m ravenous.’
‘Didn’t have time in the end.’ He raked his fingers through his hair and shifted on his feet before settling his dark eyes on her face. ‘Sofia, we need to talk.’
‘Sure.’ The smile faltered and her defences slammed into place, and she stepped back, shielding her eyes to look up at him. ‘I expect you’ve finally got round to realising that the Walters are going to be back pretty soon and you have to get down to actually doing some gardening.’
‘I’d forgotten their existence, in point of fact. So, no, that realisation hasn’t come home to roost.’
‘Shall I make us something to eat? Er...we could talk in the kitchen. Or out here. Although, it’s really hot, and anyway I shouldn’t really be swimming in this pool. It’s not what I’m being paid to do while my employers are away.’
‘Going inside might be a good idea, Sofia. You’re going to have to sit down to hear me out.’
‘Really?’ Her voice cooled because she could smell a warning a mile off. Had he noticed the way she had gradually thawed? Maybe he’d sensed her increasing desire and was politely about to tell her that he wasn’t up for grabs.
She had no idea whether he was involved with anyone, or even married! She’d made assumptions and was now mortified that she might have got those assumptions wrong.
‘Really.’
Rafael began walking towards the sprawling villa, and after a few seconds of hesitation Sofia followed in his wake.
He didn’t swerve towards the kitchen. Instead, he headed towards the sitting room and then turned, waiting as she entered and then stopped dead in her tracks, hovering just inside the door.
‘What’s going on, Rafael?’
‘Sit.’
‘Thanks, but I’m fine standing right here.’
‘I’m not entirely sure where to begin.’ He paused. ‘Maybe you should just take a look at this.’ He flicked open his wallet and pulled out an article on his godfather that he had printed off before he had left London, knowing that when the story emerged the online entry might explain more than he would be able to. He handed her the paper and then stepped back to watch her face as she scanned it before returning it to him.
‘So?’ she flung challengingly at him.
‘Recognise the name?’
‘I haven’t got a clue who that person is.’
‘You mother never mentioned names when she was talking about your father?’
Colour leeched out of her face as she stared at him wordlessly for a few seconds. ‘No.’
‘The man you’ve just read about is your father.’
‘I don’t believe you.’ She stumbled into the room and fell into one of the chairs, then promptly sat forward, horribly conscious of her state of undress. Primly, she draped the towel she had been carrying across her thighs and watched as he drew a chair to sit directly facing her.
Was this some sort of interrogation? Surely he couldn’t be right? She tried frantically to remember what her mother had said about her father aside from, in her last few days, when she had repeatedly told her that he had broken her heart. Had she described the guy at all? No. He’d been much older than her at the time, but she had shied away from details. Sofia had never bothered to pry, because what would have been the use?
‘Why wouldn’t you? What reason would I have to lie?’
‘Look, I don’t know what’s going on but—’
‘Hear me out, Sofia, and you will. David Dunmore is your father. Your mother contacted him shortly before she died. Her conscience, it would seem, got the better of her. She told him that he had a daughter. You. He had people check you out as soon as he received that letter from your mother.’
‘Had people check me out?’
‘These things happen.’ Rafael shrugged.
‘No. Not in my world, they don’t happen.’ She stared at him stonily. ‘Who are you?’ she demanded, leaping to her feet. ‘I don’t want to be having this conversation. I need to... I need to...’
‘You need to sit and listen to what I have to say. Sofia, I didn’t come over here from London to play at being a gardener.’
‘Then why have you come?’ She sat back down, very slowly, riveted to his beautiful face, chilled by the cold containment of his expression. This was certainly not the warm, teasing guy she had begun losing her head over. This was a stranger on a mission and it was dawning on her that the mission might not be to her liking.
But confusion rendered her speechless while her thoughts buzzed in her head like a swarm of angry wasps.
‘David Dunmore is my godfather and I was tasked with coming over here to personally check you out. Not check out the veracity of your identity, but to check out what sort of person you are.’
Sofia stared at him sickly as pieces of the jigsaw puzzle began meshing together, revealing a picture she didn’t want to acknowledge.
‘There must be some mistake,’ she whispered. ‘And even if there isn’t...even if that man happens to be my father...why would he send someone over here to check and see what I might be like?’
‘That man happens to be an extremely wealthy person,’ Rafael told her flatly. ‘Wealthy people take the necessary precautions.’
‘And you...? If you’re not a gardener, are you wealthy as well?’
‘I am beyond wealthy.’
That statement of fact dimly registered in a part of her brain that was already recognising that this was no joke. This man—the man she’d thought she was getting to know, the one man to have broken through her defences—was not the person she had thought him to be. In short, he was a spy sent over to get the measure of her for reasons he hadn’t fully disclosed, but which he was about to.
‘I should have guessed,’ she said bitterly.
‘How so?’
‘Just the way you were. Arrogant. Dismissive. How did you manage to wangle a job here as a gardener?’
‘David managed that feat and, believe me, I was dubious about the validity of this...fishing expedition but...’ He paused, expression thoughtful as he mulled over the direction the conversation should take.
Sofia watched. What else could she do? Watched, and waited and cursed herself for letting her trusted instinct to keep all men at arm’s length go to pot.
She should have known that all that charm, those sinful good looks, that mesmerising personality came at a price. She was paying the price now as she accepted how far she had been sucked into the magical aura he exuded.
She’d been ready to fall into his arms and sleep with him!
‘But...?’ she questioned coldly.
‘But, firstly, I should explain that he has no other natural children of his own. He’s been married twice, and both marriages ended in divorce, and extremely ac
rimonious divorce at that. And neither of those marriages yielded any children, although he did inherit a stepson who now owns a substantial amount of shares in his company.’
‘What does that have to do with me?’
‘Ostensibly, it should have nothing to do with you whatsoever, but in point of fact you, by virtue of your blood line, are in line to naturally inherit the rest of the shares held by your father.’
‘I have no idea where you’re going with this.’
‘Surely you’re beginning to join the dots, Sofia?’
‘Why would someone I’ve never met, someone who never knew I existed until a handful of months ago, care one way or another about blood lines?’ She laughed scornfully.
‘David’s stepson,’ Rafael informed her heavily, ‘has been proving to be something of a problem ever since he came of age.’ Rafael lapsed into temporary silence, his dark brows knitted in a frown. Without warning, he vaulted upright and began pacing the room, a vision of such superb grace and elegance that the breath caught in her throat and she had to look away to stop the treacherous pounding of her heart.
He came to rest directly in front of her, staring down into her upturned face.
‘He was given shares courtesy of my godfather’s extremely cunning ex-wife and her very efficient divorce lawyer. Not enough to take over the company but enough to be a nuisance. Under normal circumstances, David would be able to contain the situation, as he has done in the past, but his health has not been good.’ Rafael’s face shadowed. ‘He has lost the desire and no longer has the energy to exert some much-needed control.’
‘I still have no idea where you’re going with this.’
‘I was sent here to see whether you were a worthy heir.’
Silence settled between them. She looked away, sick to her stomach, because she knew now that all that flirting, those dangerously seductive glances, that lazy banter that had made her squirm with crazy, stupid excitement and lust, had all been part of a bigger plan. While she’d been busy letting her heart rule her head, he’d been busy keeping tabs to see what sort of person she was.
‘A worthy heir,’ she said woodenly. ‘A worthy heir to do what, exactly? Bond with someone I don’t know from Adam and have no desire to meet?’
‘A worthy heir to take over from David...at the very least in name.’ He resumed sitting but this time there was a tension in his posture that hadn’t been there before.
Sofia noted it without even realising that she was doing so. Her mind was too full of other things to pay attention to what was happening on the periphery of her consciousness.
She burst out laughing, genuine, unrestrained laughter, because the whole situation was beginning to feel a little preposterous. If it weren’t for the deadly serious expression on Rafael’s face, she would almost have expected a camera crew to jump out from behind the sofa, yelling that she’d been tricked.
‘Share the joke?’ Rafael asked coolly.
‘What’s funny is the thought of me being checked out to see if I fit the bill as a company director! I hate to break the bad news, but nannies don’t really have that level of experience. Sure, I’m doing my accountancy exams in my own time, but somehow I don’t think that’s going to be sufficient, do you?’
‘No. You could no more run my godfather’s company than you could harness a horse and ride to the moon.’
‘Thanks for the vote of confidence, Rafael,’ Sofia said acidly.
‘I’m being realistic. You’re not equipped to go near a billion-dollar business. But here’s where it gets interesting, Sofia.’ His eyes locked to hers and a shiver ran up and down her spine, a fast, cold, tickling sensation that suddenly made her pulses race. ‘I’m not just here to check your suitability as an heir. I’m here to check your suitability as a wife.’
For a few seconds she thought that she had misheard him. Her mouth fell open, her eyes widened, but whatever she wanted to stay remained stuck firmly in her throat.
‘You’re in shock,’ Rafael told her calmly. He stood up, vanished for a couple of minutes while she remained sitting as frozen as a statue, then returned with a glass of something strong and golden and told her to drink it.
She obeyed and the fiery liquid coursed a burning path down her throat. It did the trick. She felt the tension ease out of her as she dared to meet his opaque, speculative gaze.
‘Before you tell me that you may have heard incorrectly, let me assure you that you haven’t. Not only was I asked to search you out and verify your personality, but dangling at the end of the request was a very tempting titbit. I marry you and I get ownership of vital sections of my godfather’s companies. Vital shares in certain areas would remain within your control. It’s complicated, because of the size of the concern, but suffice to say that David’s proposition...’ Rafael half-smiled, the tension draining away for a few seconds, ‘Was pretty shrewd. The leisure side of his portfolio would be signed over to me, and that sly old fox has known for a long time that I’ve expressed interest in that side of his company, so handing it over would be quite the temptation. And, as your husband, I would legitimately be able to put things in order within the rest of the company and sort Freddy out once and for all.’
And his godfather would be happy. David’s happiness was all that mattered to Rafael and, as far as he was concerned, a marriage of convenience unsullied by emotion made a lot of sense.
‘You’ve got to be joking.’
‘I fully intended to take a bit more time getting to know you, but I’ve broached this now because things have unexpectedly come to a head. My godfather...’ He glanced away and Sofia saw the giveaway tightening of his jaw that revealed a depth of emotion that she suspected was never allowed to surface. ‘My godfather, your father,’ he continued, gathering himself in record time, ‘has been rushed to the hospital with another heart attack. The consultant called me to say that he’s out of surgery but whether he will fully recover or not remains to be seen.’
‘I’m really sorry, Rafael.’ Her natural instinct to empathise won over the horror of being manipulated by the man sitting in front of her.
‘Let’s leave that to one side,’ was his brusque response. ‘The fact is that time is no longer on my side. I came here to do a job—suss you out and take the necessary steps.’
‘Well, you’ve wasted your time.’ She stood up, empathy safely back in its box, and walked towards the door. She half-expected him to tell her to sit back down, but he didn’t. However, she still didn’t leave the room, as her head was telling her to do.
‘Like I said, I don’t know my father and I have no interest in finding out about him. And marry you?’ She laughed incredulously. ‘You’re living on a different planet if you think that I would just walk up the aisle with some guy I’ve known for five minutes because he’s running an errand for his godfather and I happen to be part of the errand!’ When he didn’t reply, she threw him a genuinely perplexed look, her slanting green eyes narrowed and questioning. ‘And why would you consider marrying a perfect stranger anyway?’
‘I see it as a business arrangement. I have no sentimental attachment to the notion of marriage. In fact, I’d never considered getting married at all until my godfather mentioned it. As arrangements go, it happened to be one that suited me on a number of fronts. It would solve the difficulties that have been plaguing my godfather for a while. I could legitimately go in and take control. And, like I said, it would also be a nice and interesting addition to my own portfolio of companies.’
‘Why doesn’t he just give you the whole damn lot and be done with it?’
‘Perhaps he would have in time. Under normal circumstances, he wouldn’t have considered it because he has always been a very vital man, more than capable of steering his vast company. But he’s been diminished and Freddy has jumped into that breach to exploit it. Hence his proposal to me,’ Rafael said honestly. ‘And there’s a gre
at deal of sentimentality attached to seeing you. He would like to get to know the daughter he’s never known...at any rate, that’s my interpretation of events.’
‘Not going to happen.’ Sofia thought of the way her mother’s life had meandered in all sorts of unfortunate directions after that life-changing affair had ended, after she’d been dumped—no doubt because at the time David Dunmore had wanted nothing permanent with some woman who had been cleaning his room.
From remarks made over the years, confidences uttered when her mother had been dying, Sofia had worked out that her mother had fallen, and fallen hard, for a guy who had walked away from her, disappeared without warning and without a backward glance. Thereafter she had lost her innocent belief in all that nonsense about love conquering all. One minute he’d been there, hot in pursuit and spinning her stories about everlasting happiness, and then poof, he’d gone. She’d been told by his friend and colleague that he wouldn’t be returning, that the best bet would be for her to hand in her notice and save herself the embarrassment of fingers pointing, because the whole messy business would hit the public domain sooner or later and she’d be kicked out.
Sofia had grown up with a mother who had traded her looks for promises of love, always searching for what she had lost and believing that she could recapture it. Loving the wrong guy had made her vulnerable. It was an excellent lesson when it came to choosing right.
‘Because you have romantic dreams about what a marriage should be?’ he questioned, expression unreadable.
Sofia stiffened and looked at him. She’d always thought herself far too practical to get swept up in the whole starry-eyed business of romance. She’d never wanted to be vulnerable the way her mother had been. Her head was firmly screwed on, and she liked it that way, but when she considered the past few days she had to admit to herself that silly romantic feelings had crept to the surface, altering the way she behaved, turning her into someone she didn’t recognise.
All that for a guy who had been sent over to do a job and had probably figured that turning on the charm would be the most efficient way of succeeding in his task.
Shock Marriage For The Powerful Spaniard (Mills & Boon Modern) (Passion in Paradise, Book 5) Page 5