Oh, who was she trying to kid? She wanted to stay, she might as well admit it. Cinderella wanted to stay at the ball—and she wanted to spend more time with this man who, if he wasn’t actually Prince Charming, was certainly the most exciting, most glamorous, most devastating male she had ever seen in her whole life.
The hollow, empty feeling that had been left behind when the fizzing excitement evaporated was now filled with a sensation like the frantic fluttering of a million butterfly wings. She was no longer as worried and fearful as she had been just moments before, but her stomach clenched in apprehension and uncertainty at the thought of the evening ahead of her.
Could she handle this? Could she cope with a man like Santos? The sort of man who was light years away from any man she had ever met before and who lived the sort of life that she had never experienced. Could she cope with even one evening in his company? But could she live with herself if she chickened out now?
Now everything was changed. And it seemed, impossibly, that Santos felt something too. But with a man like him she was in out of her depth and she knew it. Everything that was sensible in her make-up, every shred of self-preservation was screaming at her to go now, leave while she still could. But at the same time every essential and most fundamental feminine cell in her body was begging her to stay. And the resulting tension, the tug of war between them, threatened to tear her in two.
Beside her, Santos moved again, lifting her hand and letting it rest against the hard warmth of his chest, so that she could count every regular, heavy beat of his heart as he looked deep into her eyes.
‘Just a dance, belleza. Is that too much to ask?’
And when he smiled down at her she knew she was lost and there was only one answer she could give.
‘No, of course it’s not too much.’
Just a dance … But would that dance mark an ending or a beginning? She only knew that she would not be able to rest until she found out.
CHAPTER FIVE
AN ENDING OR a beginning?
The reception was over, everyone had left, but she still had no idea of what the answer to her question could be.
Alexa hurried down the curving stone steps that led from the terrace to the swimming pool, anxious to get onto the lower level of the garden where she would be hidden from sight by the shadows and the darkness. She needed time on her own to snatch in deep, much needed breaths of air, cool her burning cheeks, and hopefully calm the racing pulse that was throbbing at her temples and making her heart thud against the walls of her chest.
She needed time to think. Time to collect her thoughts and try to bring them under some sort of control.
Reaching the tiled area that surrounded the pool, she settled down on one of the wooden seats and kicked off the crippling shoes, sighing deeply as her cramped toes were freed and the pressure of the straps over her feet eased. If only she could ease the confusion in her mind as easily.
She was supposed to be the sensible one—the level-headed, thoughtful, grown-up daughter of the Montague family. She had never felt this way before. Never known anything like the explosion of sensation that had blown up right in her face in the time she had known Santos Cordero.
‘Time? What time?’ Alexa asked herself on a shaken laugh, lifting her face to stare up at the moon that shone its cool, clear light down onto the still water of the pool. She had barely known Santos more than a day, had only been in his company for a few hours at most, and yet somehow he had rocked her world and her sense of any sort of reality.
Nothing in the few gentle relationships—she could hardly even call them romances—that she had experienced had ever knocked her off her feet like this. Nothing had prepared her for the sensation of being emotionally whirled up into the air, spun round and round and finally dropped back down to earth to find that nothing at all was the same as it had been before.
And that was why she was here, in the darkness, trying to snatch some deep, calming breaths, trying to centre herself again, trying to see if she could find the Alexa she thought she was, or discover whether that Alexa had been totally destroyed by the passionate, sensual volcano that had suddenly erupted inside her head and her heart.
And all for the worst possible man in the whole world. A man she neither trusted nor truly liked. A man who lived up to his nickname of el brigante in both his business life and, it seemed, his private one.
‘Alexandra?’
The voice, male, beautifully accented, came from above her, from the terrace that she had just left. Of course, she knew instantly who it was. Already that tone, that accent, the true sound of his voice was etched onto her brain, impossible now to hope to erase.
‘Alexa!’
She wanted to stay silent, stay hidden. She didn’t feel ready to face him, particularly not now when she was alone with him, when there was no one else here; no one to dilute the powerful impact of his presence.
She’d watched the fleet of elegant cars arrive at the door of the house, watched all the other guests get in and drive away, and all the time Santos had kept her by his side, his hand on her arm, as he said goodbye, shook hands, watched them leave. Each time a new car had appeared she had hoped that this would be her chance to escape. To leave and hurry back to the hotel, where she would be able to go to the haven of her room and sit quietly, reflecting on all that had happened.
She had to wait for a car because as a bridesmaid she hadn’t brought a bag with her, no money—nothing. So she was totally dependent on whatever Santos might decide.
But never once had Santos turned to her, held the car door open, helped her into it. Instead he had seemed oblivious of her presence at his side until she had finally had enough and stepped forward, tugging on his arm.
‘I hope you have a car for me soon,’ she’d begun, the need to be gone making her voice rough and uneven. ‘I need to get back …’
The words died on her tongue as she saw his glittering eyes flash over her in cool assessment as he shook his dark head.
‘Not yet.’
‘Not yet?’ she could only echo in shock and consternation. ‘What do you mean, not yet?’
‘We have things to discuss,’ he’d said.
‘We do?’
That dark head moved in agreement and he reached out to touch one finger to her cheek.
‘We do.’
Before she could take it any further he had turned back to another departing guest, switching on a smile that had none of the stunning impact she had seen earlier. And unless she created a scene, throwing a tantrum in front of everyone, there was nothing she could do but wait and watch everyone else leave while inside her head the words that Santos had used earlier circled round and round.
I’m not ready to let you go … You’re here because I want you here.
Then she’d taken them as a compliment. Now she was no longer so sure. Had she been here all afternoon because he wanted to use her company to distract him from the public stab at his pride that had been his jilting at the altar? Or was she, as a slow, creeping sense of dread was starting to make her fear, here as some sort of prisoner, the reasons for which she couldn’t begin to guess?
‘What are you doing down here?’
Staying silent hadn’t worked. He’d known she was here all the time. Either that, or some faint movement she hadn’t been aware of making had given her away.
Just the sound of his footsteps coming swiftly down the flight of stone steps, bringing him to her side, made her whole body quiver in response.
‘I needed a break—a breath of air.’
‘I know how you feel. It’s been a long day.’
There it was again, that note in his tone that suggested the reception that had now come to an end had been a strain for him too.
He came to sit beside her, his lean, strong body a darker, bulkier shadow in the gathering dusk, and on the still air she caught a waft of the scent of his skin, clean and warm and faintly musky. Instantly she was transported back to the moments earlier,
inside his beautiful house, when she had been held in his arms as they danced. She had been so near to him then that she had felt his breath on her skin as he bent his head close to hers, and the strong, steady thud of his heart under the hard ribcage had beat under the touch of her hand so that she had sensed her own pulse rate kick up instantly in response.
She had felt surrounded by him, enclosed by his touch, lost in the sight, the sound, the feel of him. And the sensation had overwhelmed her. She didn’t like the way that he made her feel, and yet at the same time it was all that she wanted to feel.
And it was a sensation that, disturbingly, was creeping over her again as Santos came close once more. Her fingers itched to reach out and touch the hard strength of his arm in the white shirt that gleamed in the moonlight. She wanted to feel the warmth of his skin, inhale its scent on each indrawn breath. She wanted to know what that beautiful mouth tasted like, how it felt to tangle her fingers in the dark fall of his hair and press their tips against the fine bones of his skull. She wanted it so much and yet at the same time it terrified her to be feeling so out of control, to have lost so much of herself.
‘But those were all your friends …’
And family, she had been going to add but, recalling his reaction earlier, she swallowed down the words hastily, not knowing whether they were safe to let fall or not.
‘If they were real friends, do you think I would have needed to go through the farce of holding a reception for a wedding that hadn’t taken place? Too many of them were business acquaintances, people it is important for me to know.’
‘That’s a very cynical approach.’
‘I’m a very cynical man.’
The harshness of his tone made her catch her breath against the impulse to ask just what had made him that way. What had turned him into a man who saw marriage as a business arrangement, the way to provide himself with an heir without any need for or thought of love? But every instinct warned that he wouldn’t welcome the question from her, and right now she didn’t want to risk pushing him too far when she didn’t know what his mood might be. Better to be careful when she felt as if she was treading on eggshells.
‘Someone once told me that to become cynical you first had to be an idealist and it was the loss of those ideals that created the disillusionment.’
‘Truly?’
Santos’s harsh bark of laughter made her flinch inside.
‘Then I fear I must be the exception that proves the rule. I was born without any ideals to lose. And if I’d had them, they would not have lasted very long as I grew up.’
‘That sounds a very sad way to live.’
‘While you were born with stars in your eyes and a belief in fairy tales and a happy-ever-after?’
She had very nearly convinced him, Santos reflected disbelievingly. She had caught him off guard and actually sounded as if she had meant what she had been saying. It must be the effect of the moonlight or the glass of two of wine he’d drunk. He wasn’t usually so easily conned.
‘No fairy tales.’ Alexa shook her head. ‘I’d be a fool to think that, wouldn’t I, with my mum and dad’s example before me?’
Claro—he’d forgotten that she was the daughter of Montague’s first wife. The marriage that had ended in divorce.
‘What happened?’
‘Petra happened.’ Her tone was wry. ‘From the minute she came into Dad’s life he couldn’t think straight. He tumbled into an affair—and when he found out that Petra was expecting Nat, he came straight home and told my mother that he wanted a divorce.’
‘And how did that make you feel?’
‘How do you think it made me feel? You have to understand, I was four—I’d lost my daddy. He’d walked out on us to live with someone else.’
Oh, he understood all right. So much more than she could imagine.
‘You didn’t want to be with him—live in London?’
The look she turned on him was pure bemusement.
‘I wouldn’t have it given.’
When she saw his faint frown of confusion, her mouth curved into a quick smile.
‘It was the last thing I wanted,’ she explained. ‘That was the way Petra wanted to live but it wouldn’t have suited me. Besides, Petra wouldn’t have wanted me and I wanted to stay with my mother. She needed me.’
‘She took it badly?’
‘That’s an understatement! Dad broke her heart and for a long time she almost gave up on things.’
‘And yet you still believe in love?’
This time her smile was wider, the light in her eyes brighter, making them a glowing, soft green.
‘It didn’t stay that way. Mum did eventually meet someone else. They’ve been married ten years now, and I’ve never seen her happier. And even if Petra isn’t exactly my sort of person …’ Her tone made it plain that this was a careful understatement. ‘Dad adores her and he’s never looked at any other woman since. Mum and Dad married the wrong people first time round. So, yes, I’d like to think that there’s someone for us all out there.’
‘And is there someone for you?’
‘Me?’
She looked flustered by the question, turning wide, surprised eyes on his face. And suddenly he knew a momentary sense of unease at the thought that there might be some man she was seeing. Not that he doubted that he could make her forget about any rival if there was one. It would just be an unwanted obstacle that he would have to get rid of.
‘No—there’s no one.’
Her gaze dropped, eyelids half closing as she answered, and he was glad that she didn’t catch the faint smile of satisfaction that he couldn’t quite suppress. At least Natalie had spoken the truth when she’d said that her sister was unattached. But the suddenly down-bent head brought the unfortunate and unflattering hairstyle yet again to his attention, making him frown in disapproval.
‘Come here …’ he said softly, that sense of satisfaction growing as he saw the way her head came up sharply, her eyes locking with his in surprise.
Deliberately he held that shocked gaze for a moment longer, wondering if she knew that her thoughts were so transparent, able to be read only too clearly in her eyes. She thought he was going to kiss her; it was written all over her face. She thought he was going to kiss her and if he did then she wouldn’t object. In fact, she wanted him to kiss her, so much so that those soft, rose-tinted lips had actually parted in anticipation. He could kiss her now and she wouldn’t do a thing to stop him. On the contrary, she would actively encourage him.
Which was precisely why he was not going to do it. Oh, he wanted to kiss her. It was quite surprising—almost shocking—how much he wanted to kiss her. But he wasn’t going to give in to that desire. She was interested now, willing even, but he wanted her more than interested, more than willing. He wanted her eager, and keen—he wanted her hungry and needing. He wanted her totally hooked so that when he made his move he could reel her in without her even having realised that she had been caught.
This sister was not going to escape him. This one was not going to run out on the deal before they even got to the altar.
‘This has to go …’
Reaching out, he buried his fingers in her hair, found one of the pins—many pins, to judge by the way that the ornate style had been ruthlessly held in place throughout the afternoon and the evening, with just a few soft brown tendrils escaping from the enforced confinement. With care he eased it from its place then tossed it aside into the grass that edged the tiled pool surround, and started hunting for the next one. Although he carefully kept his attention apparently fixed on the task in hand, he was well aware of the way that her expression had changed, her face dropping, that anticipatory light leaving her eyes and something very close to disappointment clouding them.
Which was just what he wanted.
Another pin found and tossed aside. And another.
And with each one that loosened he could bury his fingers deeper in the smooth strands. Her hair really was amazingl
y silky; it slid underneath his fingertips like slippery satin, fine and sleek and so sensual to the touch. And as the strands were released, falling loosely around her face, down onto her shoulders, they gave up a soft, clean perfume, a mixture of some tangy citrus and an intensely feminine scent, one that immediately gave him a kick of sensuality as he recalled that it was the way her skin had smelt up close as he had held her in his arms when they danced. The twisting feeling low down in his body was so unexpected, so powerful that for a moment he paused, fingers still tangled in her hair as he fought down the very primitive masculine response.
‘I’m surprised you don’t have a blinding headache after keeping your hair pinned up like this all day.’
He made himself say it calmly, his tone under control; he even let himself stroke his fingers along the silky strands, enjoying the feel of it against his skin, making her perfume rise to his nostrils again.
‘I have—had,’ Alexa admitted. ‘I’ve been wanting to pull the pins out all afternoon.’
Instinctively she arched her neck, pressing her skull back against his fingers and shaking her head to feel the freedom of the now loose hair.
‘That feels so much better.’
Santos fought a battle with himself against the urge to tangle his fingers in the tumbling mane, twisting it to hold her just where he wanted her while he kissed her newly softened mouth. But he did allow himself to comb his hand through it, adding to the tousled effect that fell around her face. The looser hairstyle, the touch of disarray suited her far more than the way it had been tightly drawn back from her face.
‘Then why did you ever wear it like that?’
‘Oh, it was Petra’s idea. She planned everything for this wedding. She wanted it to be perfect for …’
Her voice faded away and he saw the hesitation and uncertainty in her eyes as she looked up at him, white teeth digging into the swell of her bottom lip.
‘You can say her name,’ he said softly. ‘The world won’t come to an end if you mention your sister. So everything had to be perfect for a wedding Natalie wasn’t going to attend.’
His Suitable Bride Page 39