In desperation she tipped the contents of her suitcase onto the floor and carefully sifted through everything, but to no avail; the documents weren’t there. Maybe Javier could phone the hotel and enquire if anyone had handed them in, she thought frantically. With no thought in her head other than the urgent need to find her passport, she shot down the hall and rapped on his bedroom door. There was no answer, and she hopped impatiently from foot to foot. She had no idea of the time, but it was imperative that she return to England and speak to her father before he learned of her forthcoming marriage from a newspaper.
She knocked again and then cautiously opened the door. Javier’s bed was empty and she swallowed at the sight of the burgundy silk sheets in rumpled disarray. His apartment was very much a bachelor pad, and from the look of it this was the seduction suite complete with a huge bed draped with a plush velvet throw and—oh goodness—an enormous mirror on the ceiling. Her wayward mind dwelled on the erotic image of his naked body lying on those sheets, his long limbs entwined with hers while she lay back on the pillows and watched their reflection—dark golden skin sliding against her paler flesh…
‘Good morning, Grace, did you sleep well?’ Javier strolled through from the en suite; rubbing his hair with a towel while another was hitched around his waist, leaving his torso and long muscular legs on display. His skin gleamed like satin, and stray droplets of water clung to the dark hairs that covered his chest and arrowed down over his tight abdomen to disappear beneath the folds of the towel.
‘I…yes…thank you.’ Coherent thought was impossible, and she could only stare at him with wide, stunned eyes. He was so gorgeous it hurt. No man had the right to look so decadently sexy. Her gaze slid to the bed and the mirror above, and her tongue darted out to trace her lower lip in an unconscious invitation.
‘Did you want something?’ Javier’s eyes narrowed at the sight of her in her white bra and French knickers. If anything she looked even more inviting than she had last night, all flushed and sleepy and incredibly sexy. The urge to dispense with her pretty lacy underwear and slide his hands into her mass of silky brown hair that fell almost to her waist was so strong that his nostrils flared, and he wished he’d covered himself with a larger towel. She was nothing like his usual choice of nubile, sophisticated blondes but for some reason this delicate English rose with her doe eyes and elusive smile caused his blood to pump through his veins so that his arousal was instant and shockingly hard.
‘I have to go home,’ Grace mumbled, tearing her eyes from the temptation of his body and focusing on the carpet. ‘I need to see my father and explain about…us—the wedding and everything—before he reads about it in the newspapers, but I can’t find my passport. I think I must have left it at the hotel.’ And yet she was absolutely certain it had been in her case. She frowned when Javier dropped the towel he had been using to dry his hair onto the bed before strolling across the room towards her.
‘Will you ring the hotel in Granada and see if it’s been found?’
‘No.’ The laconic reply stirred her temper and she crossed her arms over her chest, belatedly wishing she had pulled on some clothes before she’d hurtled into his room. His bold amber gaze skimmed her curves and caused heat to suffuse her body. She remembered the way he’d dragged her against the burning heat of his pelvis the previous night, and for the life of her she couldn’t prevent her eyes from straying down to the towel draped around his hips.
‘This is important, Javier, I have to find my passport.’
He regarded her silently through hooded lids for what seemed an age. The sexual chemistry between them was a potent force, Grace acknowledged as her pulse rate accelerated. It would only take one of them to make a move and the whole room would ignite. But it was imperative to remember why she was here—her father. ‘Javier…please.’
‘Your passport is locked away in my safe.’ He finally broke eye contact and moved away from her to extract a shirt from the wardrobe.
‘But…how did it get there?’ She watched as he slid his arms into the shirt and began to fasten the buttons. ‘Did you steal it out of my case?’
‘I did not steal it. Your father is the expert thief, not me, querida. I simply removed it from your case to keep it secure.’
‘Well, you can damn well give it back.’ Twin spots of colour burned on Grace’s cheeks. ‘How dare you rifle through my personal belongings? Will you please fetch it. With any luck I’ll be able to change my flight for one that leaves today.’
‘Do you seriously expect me to allow you to travel back to England?’ Javier demanded with breathtaking arrogance. ‘Your father’s debts have been settled from my personal account and he is free from the threat of prosecution. What’s to stop you disappearing with him and reneging on our deal? Understand this, querida, I’m not letting you out of my sight until my ring is on your finger and our marriage pact sealed.’
‘But I promise I won’t disappear. You have my word,’ Grace assured him desperately, her heart sinking at the determined gleam in his eyes.
‘You are a Beresford, and I’ve learned to my cost that your word means nothing,’ Javier told her scathingly. ‘Anyway, there’s no time to go to England. Today we’re returning to El Castillo de Leon, to prepare for our wedding. There’s a lot to do and little time to make all the necessary arrangements.’
Grace ran a shaky hand through her hair, struggling to hide her confusion and dismay. ‘What sort of arrangements? Surely we’re just going to do the deed in some brief civil service? It’s hardly going to be a fairy-tale wedding.’
‘Naturally the marriage of the Duque de Herrera is an important event,’ Javier informed her haughtily. ‘My staff have been instructed to cater for several hundred guests, including many members of Spanish nobility. The service will take place in the castle chapel, and I am impatient to return to Granada to oversee the arrangements.’ He took a pair of trousers from a hanger and spared her a brief glance. ‘Before we leave I have organised for one of Madrid’s top designers to measure you for your wedding dress. She’ll be here soon. I suggest you go and put something on, unless you intend to greet her in your underwear.’ His brows rose fractionally and he gave her a cool smile. ‘Although personally I have no objection to your state of undress, querida.’
Oh, she’d like to have slapped that insolent smile from his face. For a few seconds Grace’s anger rendered her speechless, but then she remembered her father and her heart lurched. Somehow she had to get through to Javier. ‘How do you think Angus will feel when he reads about our so-called relationship in the papers?’ she whispered.
‘I imagine he’ll think you’ve been a very clever girl. He obviously sent you to the castillo to try and entice me into helping him, and instead you’ve hit the jackpot—marriage to a millionaire who’ll wipe his slate clean.’
The contempt in his tone made her want to shrivel. ‘Dad had no idea that I…approached you,’ Grace said sharply. ‘And he would be appalled if he knew what I was doing. He’d do anything in his power to try and stop me.’
‘Then it’s lucky you won’t have an opportunity to see him until the ink on our wedding certificate is well and truly dry. You’re in too deep to back out now, Grace,’ he warned her harshly. ‘I swear I’ll get you down the aisle even if I have to drag you.’ He flicked an impatient glance at his watch. ‘Time’s getting on and I want to get dressed.’
‘Javier, please listen to me…’ Grace stumbled towards him and then gasped when his hands moved to unwind the towel from around his waist. ‘What are you doing?’
‘Putting some clothes on,’ came the succinct reply. ‘You can watch if you like.’
With a cry of frustration mixed with scalding embarrassment, Grace shot out of the room and slammed the door, his laughter following her all the way back to her own room. She hated him, she told her reflection as she pulled on jeans and a tee shirt and brushed the tears from her eyes. He was hard and ruthless and utterly unforgiving, but for a whole year he would
be her husband.
Without her passport she was trapped, escape seemed impossible. For a few seconds the same feeling of dread that had filled her when she’d first discovered the extent of her father’s financial troubles threatened to overwhelm her. She should never have gone within a hundred-mile radius of Javier Herrera, but it was too late to turn back now.
When Grace finally emerged from her room after a good cry, she found Javier in the kitchen, sitting at the breakfast bar and reading the paper.
‘There’s coffee in the pot, or fruit juice if you prefer,’ he greeted her coolly, his sharp-eyed scrutiny noting her pink-rimmed eyes. ‘What would you like to eat?’
‘I’m not hungry, thanks.’ Grace carefully avoided looking at him and concentrated on pouring a glass of orange juice.
‘You barely touched your meal last night—don’t think I didn’t notice. You need to eat.’
‘I told you, I’m not hungry—I rarely eat breakfast.’ This time her tone was sharper although she still refused to look at him. She hauled herself onto one of the tall bar stools and perched there, looking small and infinitely fragile. Javier’s jaw tightened and he forced himself to glance at his paper. For some reason Grace got to him in a way that no other woman had ever done, and it was intensely irritating.
‘Reports of our engagement are in many of the newspapers. You photograph well,’ he said brusquely, staring at the picture of Grace holding his arm and smiling up at him. In the photo she looked young and unsure, and for the first time he acknowledged that beneath her bravado she was scared. ‘I did not say so last night, but you looked very beautiful,’ he added quietly.
She pointedly ignored the newspaper that he held out to her, but could not control the soft colour that flooded her cheeks. ‘I’ll take your word for it.’
The flare of surprise in her eyes intrigued him. Surely she was aware of the effect she had on him? Dios, he’d come close to embarrassing himself when they’d danced together at the banquet, and he had spent a restless night wishing he’d followed his instincts and taken her to his bed.
Her resistance would have been minimal, he thought, not bothering to mask his satisfied smile. He’d seen the way she’d looked at him earlier and noted the way her eyes had widened when she’d spied the mirror above his bed. There was no doubt in his mind that Grace was as aware of the simmering sexual chemistry between them as he was, and he didn’t understand why she couldn’t simply admit to it honestly instead of playing mind games. In that respect she was the same as every other woman he’d ever come across, he thought with a frown of disappointment. What madness had made him believe she might be different?
She had finished her juice and was glancing around the kitchen and down the hallway.
‘What are you looking for?’ he asked curiously.
‘I was wondering where your housekeeper was. I haven’t met her yet,’ came the reply.
‘I thought I’d already explained that yesterday was Pilar’s day off. She won’t be back until later this morning.’
That caught her attention. Her head swung round and she glared at him. ‘In that case, who undressed me and put me to bed last night? Don’t tell me it was you?’ Her eyes shimmered with angry tears and she blinked hard to disperse them. ‘You’re so damned arrogant. You think you can do whatever you like, but you don’t own me you know.’
‘Not yet, querida,’ he murmured in a dulcet tone. The door buzzer sounded. ‘I think the couturier is here for your fitting.’ He paused in the doorway and stared at her. ‘Why were you crying?’
‘I wasn’t crying.’ The slight quirk of his brows spoke of his patent disbelief, and she shrugged. What was the point in lying when his golden eyes seemed to see inside her soul? ‘I’m worried about Dad. It’s all right,’ she added bitterly. ‘I’m aware of your opinion of him and I know you don’t understand. Love is an alien emotion to you, isn’t it, Javier?’
‘All charges against Angus have been dropped—my lawyers phoned earlier this morning to let me know.’ Javier watched the tension drain from her and saw the visible relief on her face. She might be a calculating bitch, but there was no denying her obvious devotion to her father.
‘Thank God,’ Grace whispered fervently. ‘Can I at least phone him to reassure him that I’m okay?’
‘Later.’ He tore his eyes from her and strode out of the kitchen. ‘Right now there are more important things to do.’
It was late afternoon when the limousine joined the queue of traffic heading for the airport. Grace had spent the journey staring out of the window, lost in her thoughts and unaware of Javier’s brooding gaze as he studied her pale face.
‘Here, you’ll need this,’ he said suddenly, flipping open his briefcase and extracting her passport.
‘I don’t need to show it for an internal flight,’ she replied in a confused voice.
He seemed to deliberately avoid making eye contact with her. ‘I have a private jet waiting to take us to England. We’ll arrive late this evening, and fly back to Granada tomorrow night, but you’ll have the day to spend with your father,’ he told her in a voice that warned her not to question the sudden change of plan.
Grace swallowed the lump in her throat. ‘I don’t know what to say—how to thank you.’ She curled her fingers around her passport and offered him a tentative smile.
‘Say nothing, querida,’ he advised coolly. ‘There’ll be time enough to thank me on our wedding night, and, I admit, I’m savouring the expectation.’
‘I wouldn’t if I were you.’ Grace felt her brief flare of happiness die and she clutched her passport to her chest as if it were a lifeline. ‘I’ve a feeling you’re going to be hugely disappointed.’
The limousine halted and the chauffeur sprang out to open the door. As he prepared to slide out of the car, Javier’s stern expression broke into devastatingly sexy smile that made Grace’s skin tingle. ‘I do hope not, querida,’ he murmured.
Several hours later Javier parked the hire-car in a narrow side street close to Eastbourne seafront and glanced disparagingly at the Belle Vue guest house. With its cream paintwork and window boxes full of busy Lizzies, Grace thought it looked rather pretty, but she doubted the Duque de Herrera had ever stayed in an English seaside B&B in his life.
‘Come on, what are you waiting for?’ he demanded when she didn’t instantly jump out of the car. ‘Haven’t you been sitting here long enough? This isn’t a car, it’s a toy designed for midgets. I knew we should have checked into a hotel close to the airport and visited your father tomorrow,’ he added irritably.
He was clearly impatient to stretch his long legs, but Grace hesitated and chewed on her lip. ‘I wanted to see Dad as soon as possible,’ she explained quietly. ‘Javier…I know you think that he and I devised the plan in which I would…offer myself to you in return for his freedom, but that really isn’t the case. Angus is unaware that I came to you for help, and I don’t want him to ever learn the real reason why we’re getting married.’ She broke off, her cheeks scarlet. ‘He would be devastated. Somehow we have to convince him that we’re in love, and that you’re prepared to forgive him for stealing from the bank because you…care for me.’
‘And how do you propose I do that?’ Javier’s eyes glittered with anger as he remembered Angus Beresford’s betrayal of his trust—a betrayal that had ultimately led Carlos Herrera to decide that his grandson wasn’t up to the job of president of the Herrera bank. He stared at Grace and noted not just embarrassment but sheer desperation in her eyes. ‘You want me to act as though I’m in love with you?’ he queried.
His sardonic amusement caused Grace to grit her teeth, but she pressed on. ‘We’ll tell him that I visited you in Spain to beg for your understanding, and it was love at first sight for both of us. We’re getting married so quickly because we…’
‘…can’t keep our hands off one another?’ Javier suggested helpfully, his teeth gleaming white against his olive skin as he smiled wickedly at her.
�
�Something like that,’ Grace agreed, eyeing him warily when he suddenly leaned across her. In the confines of the small car he was too close for comfort, and her senses flared as she caught the seductive musk of his cologne. ‘What are you doing?’
‘I need to practise this love thing. As you know, it’s not an emotion that I’m familiar with, querida,’ he whispered smoothly. ‘Do you think Angus will be reassured if I kiss you like this?’ His mouth brushed over hers in a slow, gentle caress that instantly had her senses clamouring for more. He lifted his head a fraction and stared into her eyes, as if he was seeking an answer to his silent question. What he saw in the blue depths must have satisfied him because he captured her lips once more in a drugging kiss that left her boneless with longing.
His tongue probed the line of her mouth until with a gasp she parted her lips and revelled in his devastating exploration. Her hands crept around his neck as he deepened the kiss to another level that was flagrantly erotic, and she shivered with excitement when she felt his long fingers slide under her tee shirt and close around her breast.
She moaned softly and tipped her head back, allowing his mouth to graze a path down her neck to her collarbone. Reality faded, leaving her a slave to pure sensation. His breath was warm on her skin, but it was the feel of his fingers easing beneath her bra cup and stroking her nipple that caused her to shift restlessly in her seat. She wanted more, wanted more of the exquisite torture as he rolled the tight peak between his thumb and forefinger. Dear God! She wanted him to drag her shirt over her head and replace his fingers with his mouth so that she felt the lash of his tongue on her sensitised flesh.
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