But she’d gone along with the marriage, hadn’t she? She had agreed to that in exchange for his money? So, okay, maybe he shouldn’t feel bad about that side of things. But the sex? She had made it quite clear that she wasn’t going into his bed because she wanted to and that was something he could fix. The last thing he really wanted, apart from marriage, was to force himself on an unwilling woman. That was the sort of thing Jerardo would do, and he really was disgusting. Why on earth hadn’t he realized how he’d been behaving before now? If his brother Primeiro had been around he would have spoken his mind, told him to get a grip and treat the woman with some respect. Dios! He missed his brother…
…
Helen awoke and was alarmed to see Ricardo tiptoeing into her room with a tray. “How long have I been asleep?” she asked, propping herself up on one elbow.
“Shh!” He took her hand firmly in his and kissed it affectionately. “You needed to rest.”
“How sweet.” Helen was taken aback by his sudden concern and gentleness. “You bringing me tea is very kind.”
“The least I could do.”
Helen took a sip, then put the cup thoughtfully back down into its saucer and summoned the courage to tell him what the doctor had said earlier. “Listen, Ricardo. I have to speak to you about what the doctor said—”
Ricardo silenced her with a finger pad to her lips. “It’s fine, I know all about it.” He sighed apologetically. “I’m afraid there’s no such thing as patient confidentiality when you’re married to an Almanza. But here.” He took a bundle of papers from the bedside table. “I have something for you. A wedding gift.”
“Oh no! Not more agreements to sign!” Helen’s voice rose in anguish. No wonder he was being so sweet, he was going in for the kill again! “I know things aren’t going quite like you planned, but I’m sure we can straighten them out, seek a second opinion or something!”
“Basta! Enough.” Ricardo blasted with agitation and then appeared to regret it as Helen shrank away from him. He coughed. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to shout. These are the documents we signed originally, and there is something I feel you should be aware of.” He spoke more softly now. “I’m sure you didn’t read them all through, and not having a lawyer’s understanding of matters it may not have made much difference if you had. What I’m trying to tell you is that nowhere in this mass of paper does it mention any marital duties.”
“It doesn’t? But—”
“It would probably be breaking the law to make such a contract, anyway. That part of the deal was just between you and me.” He placed the papers back on the table and walked slowly towards the door. “So, I’m releasing you from that side of the bargain. The money is yours to keep and you are under no legal or moral obligation to sleep with me. I do hope you like your wedding present, Helen.” He looked thoughtfully out towards the sound of crashing waves outside. “And in no time I’ll give you your name back too.”
As the cabin door shut behind him, Helen suppressed the urge to yell “don’t I have any say in any of this?” but the words dried in her mouth as she struggled to absorb what had happened since they’d boarded the yacht. She was off the pill and Ricardo? Ricardo was suddenly off her! She had been unceremoniously dumped from his bedroom plans. So did this mean he’d now be straight off to some high-class bordello to satisfy his marital needs? He’d have to “protect” himself there presumably. Or maybe not. She had no idea how these things worked, but she was suddenly feeling a lot healthier. She was suddenly feeling extremely angry too.
“Now you come back here!” she yelled, storming out on deck with just a silk robe over her underwear. “We still have things to talk about, Ricardo Almanza. Don’t you dare dismiss me.”
Ricardo leaned against the glass balcony overlooking the ocean, and his bronze eyes widened in astonishment. “Please don’t let me stop you in full flow,” he said politely and gestured for her to sit on one of the luxurious sun loungers laid out for them. “Talk away.”
“Well,” Helen said, the thunder having been well and truly stolen from her. “I want to know what happens from here. Do I sit around and play the dutiful wife for three months while you cavort with the nearest supermodel? Part of our convenient marriage vows did deal with the subject of fidelity, as you may recall. I know the whole thing is as sham, but I don’t think I could stand being totally humiliated.”
“Not even for all that money?” Ricardo said quietly, his forefinger pressed against his temple.
“No. I do have some self-respect.” Helen squeezed her lips together in a desperate attempt to stop the angry irrational tears she could feel welling up.
Ricardo sighed and rubbed his eyes laboriously with the heels of his hands. “Dios! I thought I was making things easier for you. Why aren’t you happy now?”
“Because—because…” She searched for a plausible reason. “You said you wanted me.”
Ricardo let out a shaky laugh and lightly scratched the darkening shadow that was beginning to appear on his square jaw. “That hasn’t changed.”
“Then I don’t understand. What has changed since we got back here?”
“I’ve had time to think in the last twenty-four hours. I came to the conclusion that this is exactly the sort of situation where I have to accept the word no. I should have done so in the very beginning. Our marriage is a legitimate contract between us and is valid in the eyes of the law. However, the other matter, the physical side of our deal, well, that’s something that should never be taken or paid for.” He formed a tent shape with his fingers and balanced his chin on it lightly. “It should always be a gift, and for that I’m sorry.” He shrugged and averted his eyes for a second. “I wanted you in my bed so much that I got carried away, forgot that this was all about my family honor in the first place. Too much testosterone. Too much temptation within my reach.”
“Like with the car?”
Ricardo leaned back and clasped his hands behind his neck, ignorant to the astonishing display his biceps were giving by doing so. “Should I compare thee to a red Ferrari?”
Helen felt her face crack into an involuntary smile. “You are such a smooth, spoiled git, Almanza…”
He gestured a silent ‘of course’ with his a flourish of his long hands and gave her a smile so devastating in its sexual pull that she had to take a sharp intake of breath.
“So what next?” Ricardo said slowly.
“I don’t know,” she said, thinking that this now sounded a bit like discussing a restaurant menu. “What do you suggest?”
“We have a fully-stocked yacht, staff, and a quarter of a million dollar’s worth of fuel on board. I have land and property just about everywhere in the Mediterranean and North Africa. There’s a helicopter and a speedboat tucked away somewhere on this vessel.” He teased her with a long pause. “So we could always throw caution to the wind and enjoy our honeymoon.”
“Our honeymoon…”
He held up his hands in a gesture of surrender. “No strings. No expectations. Just a holiday. But we have to be realistic. It’s only a matter of time before the paparazzi get wind of where we are every time we make land. Our wedding and honeymoon pictures will be changing hands for a lot of money until another big story comes along. Malaga and Ibiza will be a nightmare, but they’ll have trouble getting to us in Menorca. We can get some peace there.” He leaned back against the balcony railing, his face easing into one of those smiles again. “So what do you think of this idea? We cooperate with the press, give the pack some good shots of us together in Ibiza, some quotes even, on the understanding they give us some privacy afterwards.”
“Do you think they will?”
“No. But if the payoff for exclusive shots drops we won’t be quite a tempting mark. ”
“It does seem like a good idea.”
“And I expect you’re missing the party scene already.”
“Well, not exactly.”
He shot her a disbelieving look. “So all we need to decide now is how
quickly we get there. If we stay cruising at this speed we should make Ibiza by morning. Alternatively, we can take the helicopter to Malaga right now, transfer to my private jet, and it will take us less than three hours.”
Helen did her best not to let her eyes grow as large as saucers. “We’d be there in time for dinner.”
He smiled. “We’d be there before the clubs in San Antonio even wake up.”
“Money is bloody useful sometimes.”
“It is.”
She despised herself for the way looking at him made her feel. His dark hair lifted and fell in the breeze, and the way he could stare at her for moments at a time without flinching set her blood on fire. Helen wished the distance between them wasn’t so wide so she could feel his breath on her skin. She wished he would roll down the crisp white silk of his shirt to hide the corded muscles of his tanned forearms. She wished she could stop her heart dancing the tarantella in her chest.
She wished he would take her to bed.
They needed to get off the yacht fast before she did something she’d regret.
“Yes,” she whispered. “Yes, let’s do it.”
.
The huge diamond on Helen’s ring finger flashed as she ran her hand film-star style through her hair and the paparazzi cameras lit up the night sky. She was showing off like a natural on the parapets of Ibiza town and looked stunning in the red silk wrap dress she’d chosen from her trousseau. She had conspired in his tipping off the biggest news agencies before they’d arrived, seemed quite excited by the prospect and was now acting up a storm.
To Ricardo’s surprise Helen was turning out to be the perfect media wife if her current performance was anything to go by.
“Why Ibiza for your wedding night, Ricardo?” a paparazzi shouted.
“Why not?” he called back. “It’s where we met, the White Isle, and we love it here.”
A female photographer leaned in close, the tool of her trade still clicking like a cicada. “Going clubbing later?”
Ricardo blinked in the flashlights, but smiled graciously. “Of course.”
The woman switched her attention to Helen. “Mrs. Almanza, what’s it like to be married to the ex—most eligible man in Europe?”
“Just Europe?” Helen grinned. “It’s wonderful. Ricardo is the man of my dreams, perfect in every way…”
There was a ripple of applause and the sea of flashing cameras acted like a lightning storm.
“Guys.” Ricardo gestured with his hands that the mob should settle. “It’s deal time. We give you an exclusive if you let us have an evening meal in peace. It is our honeymoon after all.” There was a collective affirmative murmur and a few wolf whistles. “I guess that’s a yes. Okay.”
Ricardo’s ears rang with the roar of the crowd as he took Helen in his arms and kissed her hard. She arched her body into his, running her hands through his hair and he felt a burst of shock as she raised her thigh to wrap it around his hip. The skirt of her wrap dress fell open and he hurriedly grasped her leg in an attempt to cover her bare flesh, but the way her tongue was behaving in his mouth told him modesty was not at the forefront of her mind. Her being crushed so wantonly against him exacerbated the involuntary stiffening below his belt. They were in danger of making a worldwide spectacle of themselves. He pulled his mouth away and eased her leg back down to the ground. “Easy,” he whispered harshly into her hair. “You’ve given them enough.”
“And I was having so much fun,” she whispered back.
His tone was stern. “Later.”
The crowd parted as Ricardo painted on a billionaire playboy smile, and his security team cleared their path to an exclusive restaurant entrance nearby. He didn’t enjoy having to be a performing seal, but sometimes it was unavoidable. However, the last thing he needed was a loose cannon for a wife for the next three months making things even worse. A performance like that would guarantee even more interest in them. He could see the rash of vulgar magazine covers already, with her smooth pale thigh taking centre stage. He suppressed a shiver and was relieved to reach the sanctuary of a private restaurant balcony overlooking Ibiza harbor.
Ricardo ordered champagne and then waited in silence until the restaurant owner left them alone with the menus. “You didn’t need to go quite so far out there.”
“No? It’s what they wanted, what you wanted. We should get some peace now. You said we would.”
“That performance has probably made matters worse. The pictures will go worldwide by morning, and the entire planet’s press will be drooling over what Senora Almanza is going to do next.” He picked up a knife and tapped the handle rhythmically on the table. “And what will your parents think?”
“They don’t buy newspapers or any magazine besides Farmers Weekly. I shouldn’t think they’ll notice.”
“It will be all over the Internet.”
Helen chuckled. “They don’t have a computer or watch anything other than local TV and that gets switched off after the local news.” She twirled her wine glass between her fingers and watched the bubbles dance for a few seconds. “Besides, they think we’re besotted newlyweds, for God’s sake. Where’s the problem?”
There was no problem. The problem was all inside him and the way he had felt when she had flaunted herself that way. The tension knotting his neck and shoulders was a strong as a trawler’s net. “Your bra is showing.”
Helen glanced down at the tiny glimpse of black satin and lace that was peeking out underneath the red silk of her dress. “It’s supposed to show. It’s the fashion with this sort of neckline.”
“Really?”
“Oh come on, Ricardo, let’s cut out all the prudery. Playboy billionaires don’t date shrinking violets, do they? Let alone marry one.”
“You surprised me, that’s all. I didn’t think you were like that.”
“Like what?”
“Exuberant.”
She bent to whisper across the table. “Of course you didn’t. You don’t know me at all. It’s a marriage of convenience, remember? A marriage to win a bet.”
“To settle a matter of honor.”
“Oh yes, of course, silly me.”
“A marriage for which you’ve been well paid. Please don’t forget that in all your excitement.”
Chapter Seven
“Had enough?”
Helen nodded and didn’t even try to shout her reply to Ricardo over the pounding music and fireworks inside the club. She was soaked to the skin with sweat and sickly sweet smelling alcohol, and although he’d bought her plenty of water to drink, the dry ice and unbearable heat made her throat feel like sandpaper. Her chest was feeling tighter by the minute. He had taken her to three of the most famous clubs in Ibiza, hotly pursued by photographers. As far as her love of clubbing was concerned he had well and truly called her bluff.
She slipped off her scarlet heels and dangled them from her fingertips as a bouncer led them through a “Staff Only” door. As it closed behind them, the throb of the music still vibrated under her bare feet and her ears were muzzy, but at least she now felt better able to breathe again. She shot Ricardo a look over her shoulder. “I don’t want to have to do that again in a hurry!”
Ricardo, following close behind, was disarmingly disheveled. “No need to shout,” he mouthed playfully.
Helen grinned back. “Sorry, deaf as a post, so noisy in there!”
The air outside the back door of the club was cool on her face and the sky shimmered with stars as Ricardo relieved her of her handbag and then took her by the hand as they walked down a side street towards the marina. “I thought you’d want to stay for a few more hours.”
The palm of his hand was dry and warm, wrapped around hers and she fought the urge to squeeze it. “Perhaps now would be the time to confess that I’ve never been that into the clubbing scene.”
“Seriously?”
“Tonight was my second time and how can you be surprised? I asked someone how much it cost to get in when you were in
the loo. A hundred euros one bloke paid and that’s before you start spending fifteen euros on a drink!”
“You know money’s not a problem now.”
“And I don’t like the music that much either.”
Ricardo chuckled and surprised her by suddenly stopping in the middle of the deserted street. He pulled her into his chest until his mouth was inches from hers. “Thank God for that,” he muttered and kissed her softly on the lips.
Helen’s eyes closed and she didn’t resist as the kiss deepened. Couldn’t resist. His mouth felt and tasted too good. Her nerve endings sizzled as his warm fingers trailed the length of her neck, skimmed the sides of her breasts and then closed around her waist, pulling her tightly against him in the cool night air. She wasn’t doing a very good job of pretending she didn’t want him, but was too tired to fight it anymore. “We should find somewhere to sleep,” she whispered as his mouth found the pulse in her neck. “There’s always my place. I’ve a spare key hidden outside still.”
“I’m never letting you go back to that dump.” He brushed his fingers across her breast, lingering on the tight bead that was pushing against the silk of her dress. “However much I want to take advantage of you right now.”
“We could—”
“I own the Gran Finca Hotel, woman. And the Playa Caribe.” He laughed into her hair. “That equates to at least a hundred king size beds with air conditioning and breakfast in the morning.”
“Oh.”
“But I’m feeling wild now the fresh air’s hit me. I want to take you down to the beach and—”
“Hey!”
Helen jumped at the sound of another man’s voice behind them. It was familiar.
The Billionaire Bundle Page 43