by Dani Collins
“I mean later,” he clarified, using the measured, disembodied voice he used when he had no choice but to go back to the dark times. “After our father died.”
He had the unnatural urge to turn up his palm and invite her hand to slip into his grip, but tensed against needing support. He needed to be strong, because as much as Trella exasperated him, she was also deeply vulnerable. He had to be a pillar for her. For all his family. Impervious.
“Grief isn’t something you can fix for anyone.” He could hear the confusion in her voice. “All you can do is be there and I know you were. Weren’t you? I know you were racing...”
“I took time off from racing after Papa died. Henri and I were dealing with...everything. Grief. The board. They refused to hand the keys to the castle to a pair of new adults still wet behind the ears. Henri was going through our father’s records, doing the sort of tedious work I can’t stand. I was doing what I could to support Mama and the girls. Trella and Gili were supposed to start back at school, but Trella kept making excuses. Things were happening online that she didn’t tell us about. Emails. Photographs and sexual harassment. Things that make me sick as a grown man. You can imagine what they did to a teenage girl with Trella’s history.”
She absorbed that in a beat of thoughtful silence, then murmured, “I always wondered why she was so adamant against starting social-media accounts. Is that what started her panic attacks?” Her hand stayed on his arm, was soothing despite just resting the light weight of her fingertips against his skin.
“Gili was getting the same messages, but neither of them wanted to worry us. She knew something was up with Trella, though. That it was worse for her. I kept saying she was just being Trella. Moody and obstinate. She had made so much progress since the kidnapping, I didn’t see—I didn’t want to see—that she was falling apart. Going past rock-bottom and not coming back. Like if I ignored it, I could keep it from happening.”
He wanted to go back and shake that ignorant young man he’d been. If he had listened to Gili, if he had pushed past Trella’s insistence that she was fine...
“She was supposed to come watch one of my races and changed her mind at the last minute. We argued and she told me to leave her alone. I took her at her word. It was the worst possible thing I could do.”
He thought he heard Isidora’s breath catch in apprehension, but he was lost in that awful moment of fearing that history had repeated itself.
“Gili was hysterical even before we got home, convinced something was wrong. We walked in the house and Trella was gone. I called the police, then checked the security footage. That’s how I figured out where to look. She was curled up in the back of her closet, biting a towel to keep from screaming, soaked with sweat.”
“Oh, Trella,” Isidora whispered, and moved her hand from his arm to cover her heart. “There were so many times when I would ask if I could come see her and she would say it wasn’t a good day. I had no idea it was ever that bad.”
“No one but family does.” He looked around, realized where he was, but no one was on deck except the two of them. Perspiration coated his back as he leaned forward, letting the breeze ripple his shirt and pull him back to the present.
“I would never tell anyone.”
“I know.” He was still impatient with himself. “I shouldn’t have said anything regardless. It’s her secret to tell, not mine. I wish I could say that was the worst of it, but those same panic attacks happened again and again, sometimes as night terrors, other times hours straight of racing heart and deep anxiety. She didn’t get them under control until she pulled out of the public eye completely. Even then, it’s been a long haul to get here. We’re all holding our breath and is she keeping a low profile, taking things slow? Hell, no. Not Trella.” He flung up an exasperated hand. “She’s sleeping with strangers, getting pregnant by a damn prince who has his own publicity nightmare to manage. That is why, cariño, I have forced you into the spotlight with me. I never want her to go through that again.”
* * *
Ramon’s tormented profile twisted her stomach into a knot.
In so many ways, this man had stolen her heart by being strong. The very first time she had ever seen him, he had picked her up off the grass at an executive picnic for Sauveterre International. She’d been five or six and he had set her on her feet like it was nothing, then called out to the boys who had rushed past and knocked her down that they should be more careful.
After the kidnapping, when her father had made house calls to his, she hadn’t understood why her friends were so different, so sad. Even some of the grown-ups cried sometimes, but if Ramon or Henri wept, they did it behind closed doors.
By the time she had begun to stir with a more primal, feminine understanding of male strength, Ramon had been a godlike figure who dominated her imagination. He’d been a dynamic alpha who tamed a thousand horses with the pedals of one car. There were no contests he didn’t win, no weights his broad shoulders couldn’t carry.
In truth, she had set him up for a role he was too human to live up to.
No wonder he had pushed her away. Who needed that much pressure? He had enough on his plate conquering his personal demons.
But until this moment, she hadn’t seen them. Not this closely. Not this nakedly.
She had sat with her hand on his arm while he had revealed the dark space inside himself. Now he had retreated into it and she wanted to respect that need for privacy, but more than anything, she wanted to pull him out of that grim place. There was no way to fix his bleak past, though. No way to guarantee bad things wouldn’t happen in the future.
All she could do was let him know he was not alone in this moment. He had drafted her into the role of his fiancée. She loved his sisters and owed his family, so she was willing to continue this engagement, but she knew in her heart, she was doing it for his sake, too. Because she was who she was and she did want to make the world a better place, one tiny ray of light at a time.
“I would let myself be photographed topless—”
“Like hell.” His head snapped around so fast, and his voice was so dour, that her heart clenched. It skipped at the same time, buoyed by a giddy urge to laugh.
She was such an idiot to think he was being protective, to like it, but she still grasped at it as she continued.
“To take the heat off this latest news about Trella.”
“I said no.”
“But we’d probably have more success if we pretended I dropped my engagement ring overboard.”
His thunderous expression eased into a faint smirk.
“You’re starting to think like me. I’m not sure that’s a good thing.” He nodded once. “Let’s eat, then go fishing.”
* * *
They managed an uneasy truce as they finished their travel into Málaga. Since they were the guests of honor at their engagement party, they stayed at the hotel where it was being held, rather than at Sus Brazos with the rest of his family.
The hotel was a completely refurbished nineteenth-century structure. All the five-star amenities had been added, but the rooms described as “charming” and “authentic” were actually “small” and “snug.” Ramon had taken their best suite, but with their own guest list competing for rooms with wealthy vacationers from across Europe, he hadn’t been able to take any extra space.
They were back to either sharing a bed or arguing, until he volunteered to take that torture device the decorator no doubt called “a delightful period piece.” It looked no bigger than the average love seat and sported filigreed armrests.
Isidora gave the bed a circumspect glance and asked if he needed the bathroom before she started getting ready.
He nursed a Scotch on the balcony, watching the waves against the beach, trying not to think of that bed behind him. Yesterday he’d spent the afternoon lusting after her in a bikini as they’d spent a couple of hours diving for an engagement ring that was in the safe in his onboard office.
Damn it, if he w
anted sex, Isidora was right. He didn’t have to go very far. He turned down more offers than he accepted. Finding someone to discreetly take the edge off behind the back of his “fiancée” would not be difficult. But as he glanced over the topless, golden bodies wandering in from a day on the sand, he found himself turned off by the idea of a quick frolic with a stranger.
He wanted Isidora. Since that night in Monaco, he had been obsessively imagining bringing her to the same kind of shattering orgasm she’d had in his lap, but pumping into her while it happened, intimately feeling her contractions of ecstasy, finding his own pleasure at the same time.
Damn, but it was hot this summer!
With a soft curse, he drained his Scotch and chewed an ice cube, then moved into the air-conditioning, finding no relief as he changed into his tuxedo.
He had never been so preoccupied by a woman. It was uncomfortable. Especially when he wanted... He shook his head at himself. He wanted to be friends. When he had opened up about Trella, Isidora hadn’t offered platitudes like “I understand,” or “it will be all right.” She had sat with her warm touch on his arm, waiting to lead him out of his own closet of fear.
That patient contact had been so profound it seemed to reach all the way to his heart. He had felt understood.
He couldn’t ruin that tentative trust by asking her again for an empty affair.
Tying his bow tie, he heard a noise behind him and turned.
And swore.
Isidora was flawless in a black-velvet, one-shoulder gown that hugged her breasts and hips. It might have bordered on unremarkable if not for the faux diamonds that traced the shoulder strap and followed the cutout beneath her left breast, drawing the eye to where the creamy skin of her rib cage and waist was exposed.
He didn’t want to just touch that bare skin, he wanted to feel the soft heat of it against his open mouth, taste it, feel her squirm under butterfly kisses and arch as he sucked.
“No?” Her hand went to her middle. “I have a red gown—”
“No. I mean yes. You have completely emptied my brain, woman.” He ate up her slender arms, her upper chest, the flex in her throat as she swallowed. Her hair was gathered with a line of sparkling diamonds, exposing a blue stone dangling from her earlobe. “You look fantastic.”
“Ramon—” Her shy face twisted into a drawn, anxious expression.
He hurried forward, like he could save something falling from a cart.
“That isn’t flattery. I’m not being polite. You have never escaped my notice, Isidora. I wanted to ignore you. I tried. But even when you were just a chatty, flat-chested sprite of a thing, I couldn’t overlook you.”
He stopped her hands from wringing by taking them in his own.
“If I hurt you—” He swore. “I know I’ve hurt you.” He circled his thumb over the tip of her pointed knuckle, aware of the way her fingers fluttered against his loose grip, like a nervous bird’s wings. “I’m sorry.”
It surprised him how hard it was to say the words. A lot of remorse came with the admission, leaving a tightness in his chest that caused a scrape in his voice.
“Sometimes yours was the only laugh we heard in our house all week. It bothers me that I might have cut that off. I don’t think I’ve heard you laugh since...”
Hell, probably since before her mother’s lounge five years ago.
He closed his eyes in regret and brought her bent fingers to his lips, pressing his apology into them.
Her breath caught. The cool stone in her ring grazed near the corner of his mouth and the backs of his thumbs touched the prickle on his own chin. He grimaced, releasing her to rub at his stubbled jaw. “I should shave before I forget.”
“You should.” Her voice was thick with emotion. “Thank you, Ramon.”
“For shaving?” He knew what she meant, but the moment was too charged for his liking. “I don’t want you to be uncomfortable when we kiss at our party.”
* * *
Completely leveled, Isidora tried to gather her composure.
I’m sorry. Such small words, spoken so quietly, but the impact was huge. Her throat felt swollen and her heart ran like a freight train in her chest.
When she heard him come back a few minutes later, she still couldn’t look at him, too moved. Too overwhelmed. She checked that she hadn’t chewed off her lipstick and swept out the door he held open for her. It wasn’t until they were in the elevator with their guards that her gaze tracked to his in the mirror they faced.
“I thought you were going to shave?” He looked quite the ruffian in a tuxedo with that five o’clock shadow. Very devil-may-care. If he loosened his bow tie her knees would unhinge completely.
He made a face and scraped his palm against his cheek. “My razor broke.”
“We could have one sent up. Do you want to go back?”
His guard, Oscar, extended a finger toward the panel.
“There’s no point. I know what the problem is and something else will happen to stop me. Resistance is futile.”
“What do you mean?” She turned from the reflection to the man. “I noticed you’ve been wearing stubble more often lately. I thought it was a fashion choice.”
“A fashion choice,” he repeated with a choked noise, clearly offended. “No. I’m not being lazy, either.”
“What then?”
“I don’t want to tell you. You’ll laugh.” His lip curled, but the way he eyed her sent rising bubbles of amusement into her chest.
She made a show of holding a bored expression and glancing at her nails. “I heard a rumor that was a goal of yours, but whatever...”
The doors opened to the lobby, putting an abrupt end to what had been the beginnings of very enjoyable, lighthearted flirting. The dull roar of conversation filled the space on the second floor, where a chandelier hung amid a gallery of masterpieces in gilded frames.
They stepped out and Ramon halted her with a touch on her arm.
“Come here, then.” He veered her from the throng crowding the marble floor around the fountain and drew her into a small kiosk. It had probably held a telephone at one point, but now housed a terminal for airline check-ins and other online tasks.
It was close quarters. She brought her hands up to rest on his lapels, conscious of the hard wall of his chest.
“What, um—” She hadn’t been this close to him since sitting astride him. The sting of a blush crept into her cheeks. She looked to the sliding door he had pulled closed behind them.
“It’s new-father syndrome. I’ve seen it with our executives. They look like they’re coming to work after a terrific bender, but it’s just a fresh baby at home.”
That surprised her into looking up with a confused frown. “Is there something you haven’t told me?” She cocked her head. “Because I must say you’re being very hard on your sister.”
“Not me. My brother.” He lightly cupped her elbows and his thumbs drew restless patterns against her skin, making a shiver run up her shoulders and into her chest, sensitizing her nipples. She tried to ignore it.
“You want me to believe that Henri is forgetting to shave so you are, too?” She shook her head. “The universe broke your razor?”
“Do you think we dress alike because we think it’s cute?”
“You’re businessmen. The uniform is a three-piece suit. Of course you’ll grab the same white shirt now and again.”
“And the same tie? And the same shoes?”
She shook her head. “I’m not as gullible as those people who think twins are psychic.” Lowering her brow, she asked with suspicion, “Are you psychic?”
“No.” Amusement played around his mouth.
He really had a beautiful mouth. The seam of his lips was quite wide, but his upper lip was defined with two strong peaks, while his bottom lip was smooth and full, inviting a nibble.
“Isidora.”
She’d never heard her name spoken in such a husky, sexy tone. When he cupped the side of her neck, she felt as
though her body fell away. She became something ephemeral, pulse throbbing against the heat of his hand on her throat as his green, green eyes held her in thrall.
“You accused me of wanting you because you’re convenient, but that is so far from the truth. My brain is telling me not to wreck the peace we’ve finally made, but I can’t stop thinking about what we started. About how passionate you are. You. It’s not convenient at all.”
She grew hotter with every word. Beyond the door, one of the guards said something.
“I think someone wants in here,” she said, desperate for escape before she did something stupid, like fall all over him again.
Ramon’s hand dropped from her neck, leaving a chill that increased as he opened the door.
* * *
The indirect lighting against the yellowed facade of the hotel, along with the candles floating in the pool, cast a warm glow over the bricked area that had been roped off all the way to the beach. A string trio played for the reception portion, to be replaced by a livelier dance band after the champagne toast.
Paparazzi had already bribed their way into positions along the velvet rails and off some balconies, determined to snap photos of the celebrities Ramon had deliberately invited. He could have held the party in the privacy of Sus Brazos, but that ultrahigh security would have defeated the purpose. This party was the event of the year, intended to dominate the society pages so Trella wouldn’t.
His sister arrived in a subtle maternity gown, choosing to let a picture speak a thousand words. Ramon sincerely hoped her plan to bury the news amid the spectacle of his engagement worked.
Letting go of his responsibility toward either of his sisters was easier said than done. At least Angelique was in good hands. Ramon had no doubt Kasim would die before allowing harm to come to her. He certainly had the resources to kill anyone who tried, but Ramon still did a quick scan to note where his sisters stood with their mother, a collective of guards on hand. Kasim, unruffled yet ever alert, stood at Angelique’s side.
His shy little sister was a queen. Ramon still hadn’t taken it in. Along with Henri and his babies, she now had too much responsibility to drop everything and rush to Trella’s side when necessary. It was all on him.