‘I’ve been looking for you everywhere,’ the woman said a shade petulantly. ‘You promised you’d dance with me.’
‘So I did, but as you can see I am talking to my wife,’ Javier answered equably. ‘Why don’t you ask one of your many young admirers to dance with you?’
‘I only want to dance with you,’ came the fierce reply.
The words ‘my wife’ caused a peculiar fluttery sensation in Grace’s stomach and she could not bring herself to meet Javier’s gaze. Instead she studied the young woman who was staring up at him with open adoration in her eyes. Her puppy-like devotion was almost embarrassing, and Grace felt herself tense as she waited for Javier to destroy the girl with one of his cruelly sarcastic comments. Instead he smiled at her, a smile of genuine warmth that lit up his eyes and softened his harsh features.
‘I’m sorry, save me a dance for another time. Look, I think your father’s ready to leave.’
‘It’s not even midnight yet. Papa’s such a bore.’ The girl pouted prettily and shook her jet black curls out of her eyes in a deliberately provocative gesture, while totally ignoring Grace. ‘Until next time, then, Javier,’ she murmured, blowing him a kiss before she spun round and sauntered across the room.
‘Miguel’s going to have trouble with that girl,’ Javier remarked. Grace followed his gaze to the girl’s curvaceous derrière and was consumed with an emotion that felt suspiciously like jealousy.
‘She’s very young. Who is she?’ she asked sharply.
‘Lucita Vasquez—her father Miguel was my grandfather’s closest friend. Miguel was nearly sixty when she was born, and I fear he has spoiled her beyond redemption,’ Javier said, his voice laced with amused affection. ‘Carlos hoped I would marry her and merge our two banking families.’
‘So why didn’t you?’ Grace snapped. ‘Anyone can see that she’s hopelessly in love with you.’
Javier did not deny her statement, but his smile faded. ‘Lucita is in love with a childish illusion, but she would soon discover that I am not her Prince Charming. She would demand more than I’m willing to give to any woman.’
He meant love, Grace realised, wondering why she suddenly felt so empty inside. Unlike Lucita, she was under no illusions about her relationship with the Duque de Herrera. Their marriage was a contract from which they both gained the thing they most wanted. For her it was her father’s freedom, and for Javier it was control of the Herrera bank. Stupid, then, to wish that he would smile at her with the warmth he had shown Lucita. They were business partners, nothing more, and she was determined to make him understand that her duties ended outside the bedroom door.
‘Don’t you ever get lonely in your ivory tower?’ she said thickly. ‘Surely everyone needs love in some form—even you.’
He stared at her speculatively for a few moments. ‘Why cloud issues with nonsensical emotion? In my experience, love is rarely given freely and without conditions attached. Far from being uplifting, it weakens and destroys, and I have no need of it.’ His eyes trailed over her ivory silk wedding dress and his mouth curled into a cynical smile. ‘Perhaps you’ve been seduced by the romance of the situation, querida, but don’t look for things that can never exist. The only emotion between us is lust, pure and simple—the sexual alchemy that turns your eyes to the colour of the night sky and makes you tremble with desire when I kiss you.’
‘You really think you’re God’s gift, don’t you?’ Grace snapped, clinging to her anger to mask her body’s traitorous reaction to his words. The searing pleasure of his mouth on hers did make her tremble, but the fact that he was aware of the effect he had on her was so humiliating. If he could reduce her to a quivering mass of longing here in front of four hundred guests, what chance did she have of resisting him when they were alone?
The way he was looking at her now, as if he was mentally stripping her, sent a tingle of anticipation through her body. Lust, pure and simple, she reassured herself, but she refused to give in to temptation. For the sake of her pride and self-respect she couldn’t afford to.
‘I need some air,’ she muttered, jumping to her feet. ‘I think your cousin wants to talk to you,’ she added frantically when Javier made to follow her. ‘You’d better go and see what he wants.’
Grace squeezed through the throng of wedding guests, out of the banqueting hall and fled up the stairs, the heavy folds of her dress hampering her steps. She flew along the landing to her room and stopped abruptly as her eyes fell on the stripped bed. With a low cry she crossed the room and flung open the wardrobe to find that it was empty.
A slight movement from the doorway made her swing round. ‘Consuela, where are my things?’ she asked the maid urgently.
‘In the master bedroom,’ the Spanish girl answered with a smile. ‘El Duque asked me to move them for you.’
Fighting the sick feeling in her stomach, Grace raced along the corridor and threw open the door to Javier’s room. The magnificent four-poster bed dominated the room, the purple and gold drapes drawn up with silk ties and the sheets turned back invitingly. She’d rather jump into a pit of vipers, Grace thought when her gaze alighted on her nightdress carefully laid out on the counterpane.
During the past few weeks she’d received countless deliveries of clothes, shoes and all manner of other accessories that Javier had obviously deemed necessary for her role as his duquesa. The overtly sexy negligées she’d watched Consuela unpack had caused her to blush furiously, much to the maid’s delight. Presumably Consuela had selected the pink silk number—with its delicate lace bodice that was so sheer it was practically transparent—with seduction in mind. But the one thought dominating Grace’s mind was escape.
‘Shall I help you remove your tiara?’ Consuela asked. ‘It’s so beautiful, but it must be very heavy.’
‘And priceless,’ Grace agreed ruefully. ‘I was so afraid of dropping it that I jammed it on as tight as possible.’ She tried to disguise her impatience while Consuela lifted the tiara from her head and removed the pins from her chignon so that her hair tumbled down her back in a sheet of pale brown silk.
‘Torres says that all the Herrera brides have worn this tiara,’ the maid explained. ‘It is said to bring them happiness and…’ She broke off with a coy giggle. ‘Many babies.’
‘Really?’ Grace said dryly. ‘Well, I wouldn’t get your hopes up on either score.’ She sighed and wished Consuela would go. She liked the young maid very much, but Javier wasn’t going to spend all night chatting with his guests and she was determined to find one of her old nightshirts and return to her own room before he came upstairs to demand his conjugal rights.
The thought was enough to make her feel weak and she gasped when his deep sexy drawl sounded from the doorway.
‘Gracias, Consuela, you can leave us now.’ He addressed the maid but his eyes were focused on Grace and she swallowed at the smouldering heat in his gaze. Too late, she thought wildly, her eyes huge in her pale face, their expression unconsciously pleading as she absorbed his height and the inherent strength of his broad chest.
‘I wasn’t expecting you to desert your guests and follow me,’ she muttered.
‘I’ve left them to it,’ he replied laconically as he closed the door after Consuela and locked it before pocketing the key. ‘Don’t worry, Torres will ensure that nobody will disturb us,’ he added, mistaking the reason for her horrified gasp. ‘We will enjoy total privacy for the rest of the night, querida.’
‘What about my privacy?’ Grace demanded huskily, taking a step backwards as he strolled over to her. He reminded her of a panther—sleek and dark and very, very dangerous—although to be fair she wasn’t afraid of him, she conceded dismally. It was herself and her shocking reaction to him that scared her. ‘I want to sleep in my own room,’ she stated baldly. ‘I’m tired…and I’ve got a headache.’
‘Poor baby.’ He moved closer until Grace found herself backed up against the dresser.
Someone had placed the pale pink roses that had been
her bridal bouquet in a vase so that their exquisite perfume filled the room. Their tight buds were already unfurling, and she watched helplessly as Javier selected a bloom and stroked it gently down her cheek.
‘Did you like your flowers today?’ he murmured, his eyes narrowing as she moistened her suddenly dry lips with the tip of her tongue.
‘They’re beautiful,’ she whispered. ‘Roses are my favourite flowers.’
‘I know.’ His slow smile told her he was thinking of the first time they’d met, when she had stolen a rose from his garden. ‘They remind me of you, delicately beautiful and perfectly formed—but with thorns that can cause real damage,’ he added a shade ruefully. For some reason Grace’s eyes were drawn to his hand. She’d noticed the small bandage around it earlier and now she frowned at the visible bloodstain on the cloth.
‘What did you do to your hand?’
‘It’s nothing.’ He shrugged and stroked his fingers through her hair. His eyes were hooded and slumberous with sensual heat. She should move, Grace thought frantically, but her feet seemed to be welded to the floor, and when he cupped her chin and lifted her face to his she couldn’t prevent herself from swaying towards him.
He kissed her with a slow thoroughness that drugged her senses and dismantled her barriers with terrifying ease. How could she fight him, when her heart was pounding in her chest so hard that she could barely breathe? Would it really be so wrong to give in to the thunderous desire that was coursing through her veins? she wondered feverishly. He was her husband—but their marriage was a sham and she didn’t love him.
His lips trailed a path down her throat and settled on the pulse beating frantically at its base. His male scent and the heat emanating from his body inflamed her senses to an unbearable degree, and she gasped her pleasure when he nipped her earlobe with his teeth before claiming her mouth once more in a burning kiss that revealed his impatience to take her to his bed.
‘Javier—no.’ She could feel his fingers on her spine, freeing the tiny pearl buttons that fastened her dress, and from somewhere she found the strength to push against his chest. ‘I meant what I said. I won’t sleep with you.’ She dragged air into her lungs and stared at him wildly. ‘I don’t want you.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous.’ His mocking grin and supreme arrogance made her grit her teeth. ‘I’m not blind, querida, I have visible evidence that I turn you on.’ His eyes settled on the hard peaks of her nipples straining against the bodice of her wedding dress. ‘You are as hungry for me as I am for you—what’s the point in denying the passion your body so clearly craves?’
‘My body may react to your undoubted expertise, but my heart and mind reject you—and they’re what count,’ she told him so fiercely that his eyes narrowed.
‘But you’re my wife.’ Before she had time to think, he spun her round and continued to unfasten her dress until he lost patience and wrenched the material apart so that the little pearls pinged in all directions.
‘Don’t!’ With a sharp cry Grace held the bodice against her breasts. ‘My beautiful dress—you’ve ruined it,’ she flung at him, appalled by his casual desecration of the fairy-tale gown that she had fallen in love with the moment she’d seen it. ‘You’re a…barbarian! Is it any wonder that I can’t bear you anywhere near me?’
His jaw tightened but when he spoke his voice was calm, almost bored. ‘I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised. What’s the real issue here, Grace? Have you decided to cash in on my obvious hunger for you? I’ve already paid a fortune for you, but that went to clear your father’s debts. I take it you now want an additional financial incentive in return for sex?’
The crack of her palm against his cheek ricocheted around the room. There followed a moment of stunned silence, and then Grace cried out when he lifted his hands and ripped her dress from her shoulders, leaving her small, pale breasts exposed to his gaze. ‘Javier—no—I won’t do this.’ She tried to cover herself with her hands, but when he snatched her into his arms she beat her fists on his shoulders, her breath leaving her body when he dropped her onto the bed and immediately came down on top of her, trapping her beneath his hard and fiercely aroused body.
‘The time for games is over, querida,’ he told her as he pinned her wrists above her head. The heat in his gaze seemed to scorch her flesh, and she shuddered in an agony of rejection mixed with shocking desire when he lowered his head and drew one throbbing peak into his mouth. The stroke of his tongue back and forth across her nipple was exquisite torture, and Grace twisted her hips restlessly. She was overwhelmed by the new and wickedly delicious sensations he was arousing within her and she couldn’t prevent a sob of relief when he transferred his mouth to her other breast and proceeded to use his tongue with devastating effect.
She was breathing hard when he finally released her, and she stared up at him with glazed eyes when he rolled off her and stood by the side of the bed.
‘Today in the chapel you promised to be my wife, Grace,’ he told her harshly. ‘And now it’s time to honour that promise.’
‘What would you know of honour?’ she demanded thickly as her sanity returned. She watched, transfixed, as he swiftly removed his shirt and trousers. In the lamplight his skin gleamed like copper, and her eyes moved of their own accord over the mass of wiry black hair that covered his chest and arrowed lower beneath the waistband of his boxer shorts.
With slow deliberation he hooked his fingers into the black silk and tugged them over his hips to reveal the jutting proof of his arousal.
‘Oh God!’ In sheer panic, Grace jerked upright and backed away from him until she was straining against the headboard. ‘Javier, I can’t do this. Please don’t make me.’ Her eyes were like twin orbs in her pale face. She’d seen the naked male form before, of course—in magazines, and even in a rather risqué television advert. But this was the first time she had ever been confronted with real flesh and blood, and the awesome sight of Javier’s fully erect penis made her close her eyes weakly.
‘This is growing a little boring, querida,’ he drawled. ‘Why do you insist on acting like a terrified virgin?’
‘Because I am a terrified virgin,’ she whispered urgently.
‘Of course you are.’ His sardonic comment masked his simmering impatience, and Grace gasped when he gripped her ankles and dragged her down the bed. The mattress dipped as he stretched out next to her. ‘Madre de Dios!’ At least have the decency to look at me while you spin your lies,’ he growled savagely, and then tensed when she lifted her lashes and he saw the expression in her fearful gaze. For long, excruciating moments he said nothing, and then he exploded with the force of Krakatoa.
‘I swear, I’ve never…been to bed with a man before,’ Grace assured him hastily.
‘But you were engaged! To a man who had a reputation around London as a serial sex addict,’ he added furiously.
‘I knew nothing of Richard’s reputation when I met him,’ Grace told him stiffly, her cheeks scarlet with embarrassment. ‘I thought he was charming and a true gentleman when he didn’t try and hurry me into bed.’
‘But you eventually learned otherwise,’ Javier guessed, his keen gaze noting the misery in hers. ‘What happened?’
Grace swallowed. Javier was lying on one hip, leaning over her slightly, but he made no attempt to touch her as he waited for her reply. ‘We met soon after I’d moved to London, and I fell for him in a big way,’ she admitted huskily. ‘It was fairly soon after my mother had died. I was feeling low, and I suppose I was lonely and vulnerable. Richard made me laugh and it was a long time since I’d done that. I was over the moon when he asked me to marry him, and I believed that his insistence that he was happy to wait until our wedding before we had a sexual relationship proved that he really loved me.’
She sighed heavily as she remembered the time in her life she would much rather forget. ‘A few weeks before the wedding I went to his flat—it was a surprise visit, and I was going to tell him that I loved him too much to wait any longer.
I knew we were going to spend the rest of our lives together and I wanted us to become lovers. Instead, the surprise was on me,’ she said bitterly. ‘I had my own key and I let myself in—to find him in bed with his housekeeper.’
‘And so you broke off your engagement?’ Javier queried.
‘Of course I did. I believe marriage should be a lifelong commitment, as my parents’ marriage was.’ She thought of the vows she had made to Javier earlier in the day and bit her lip. ‘I thought that the love I shared with Richard would last for ever, but it was all a sham, just like our marriage is a sham. Richard only wanted to marry me because my pathetic infatuation with him boosted his ego. I must have been the answer to his prayers, so stupidly in love with him with him that I never questioned the times he had to work late or suddenly disappeared for several days on a business conference.’
She took a deep breath and stared at Javier, her heart in her eyes. ‘Despite all the pain Richard caused me, I still believe in love—the kind of deep, enduring love that my parents shared. One day I hope I’ll meet a man who I will love for ever and who will love me, and he’s the man I want to honour with my body.’
Javier stared back at her, his amber eyes glittering with frustration. ‘Dios!’ He spat savagely as he suddenly rolled off the bed and dragged on his underwear. ‘It’s just my luck to find myself saddled with a wife who has the tongue of a viper, the face and body of a siren and the innocence of a vestal virgin.’ He flung the pink nightdress at her, his temper sizzling. ‘You’d better put this on before I come back.’
‘Where are you going?’ Grace mumbled as she clutched the negligee to her breasts.
‘To take a long, cold shower.’
‘I’ll sleep in my old room,’ she said quickly. ‘If you could just unlock your bedroom door.’
‘This is our bedroom, and from now on we will both sleep in it,’ Javier snapped imperiously. ‘I told you, I don’t want anyone, even the staff, to suspect that our marriage is anything other than a love match.’
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