Master of El Corazon (Harlequin Presents)

by Sandra Marton

  Evelyn had tut-tutted in sympathy. ‘Who knows what’s floating around in the jungle?’ she’d said, and Arden had skilfully led the discussion elsewhere, before her mother could bring it back to dangerous waters.

  Arden folded the empty grocery sack neatly, put it away in the broom cupboard, and turned to the refrigerator. What would tonight’s gourmet treat be? she thought wryly as she peered into the freezer. Chicken Alfredo? Filet of sole? Boeuf aux champignons? She made a face and plucked out a package at random.

  ‘Garden lasagna,’ she read aloud as she tore off the paper covering, then set the plastic dish in the microwave oven.

  Not that it mattered, she thought, unzipping her dress as she made her way down the hall to the bedroom. Frozen dinners all tasted exactly the same, no matter what the label promised. But they were quick and required no planning, something she wasn’t too good at lately. Perhaps when the weekend came round, she’d take the time to cook for herself...

  And then again, she thought, sighing as she stepped from her dress and kicked off her shoes, perhaps she wouldn’t. It seemed an awful lot of trouble to go through for one person, shopping for meat and vegetables and such, measuring and tasting and timing, when in truth it didn’t much matter if she sat down to the finest meal cooked by a cordon bleu chef or to the least distinguishable blob to come off a food packager’s assembly line. Everything tasted like straw, ever since she’d come back from Costa Rica.

  Arden sighed again as slipped on a pair of cotton trousers and an oversized washed silk T-shirt. The simple truth was that she couldn’t seem to get excited about anything since she’d come home, not even about her new job, which was crazy because it was really a terrific job, much better paying than the last, with lots more responsibilities and opportunities for advancement.

  ‘It’s the weather,’ she mumbled aloud as she took the plastic dish from the microwave oven. Of course it was. The heat, the rain—it was enough to make anybody feel depressed.

  She tore back the top seal and sniffed at the greyish stuff inside the dish, grimacing with distaste before setting the dish on the table and taking a fork and napkin from the drawer. She sat down, put the napkin in her lap, and stabbed at the mess.

  What did she mean, depressed? She wasn’t ‘depressed’. Why should she be? she thought, holding her breath as she chewed a mouthful of tonight’s dinnertime treat and then swallowed it down. She had a great new job, her apartment—paid for all the months she’d been gone by McCann, Flint, Emerson—seemed none the worse for having stood empty, and autumn would be coming on soon, which meant the city would roll into high gear and opera, ballet, the symphony orchestra and new Broadway productions would offer themselves up like a smorgasbord of cultural delights. The man Irene worked for, a nice enough sort whose mid-western accent and easy manner confirmed Irene’s whispered tale of his having worked his way up from office boy, had been suggesting lately that it would be nice to attend some of those events together.

  ‘You ought to take the guy up on it,’ Irene kept saying. ‘He’s really awfully nice.’

  And he was, Arden thought, putting down her fork and shoving the horrible little plastic dish away. But she wasn’t any more interested in getting involved with anybody now than she’d been before she’d gone to Costa Rica, not even someone who was unpretentious and self-made, who tried very hard to make her smile—who was tall and dark-haired and, at a distance, a very great distance, might almost be mistaken for Conor. But he wasn’t Conor, he never would be; he hadn’t Conor’s charm not his swift temper, he couldn’t make her heart stop with just a smile or a softly whispered word...

  ‘Damn!’

  Arden shot up from the table, grabbed the frozen dinner, and plopped it into the garbage bin. What was the matter with her tonight? Charm? Conor had charm, all right, the sort conmen had relied upon for years. As for his soft whispers, she thought grimly, they’d been about as substantial as cobwebs.

  Not that she cared. By now, she knew that she’d never loved him at all. What she’d been was dazzled—by his looks, by his charlatan’s practised charm—no, she thought as she strode into the living-room and sank down at the old secretaire she’d salvaged from the flea market on Third Avenue, no, she’d never cared one little bit for Conor Martinez. If she’d just kept to the opinion she’d had of him right from the start, she’d have saved herself lots of time and tears.

  At least, it would be over soon. Arden’s jaw firmed as she pulled open the top drawer of the secretaire and withdrew an envelope stuffed with papers. She pulled them out, spread them across the desktop, and riffled through them. Felix’s will had passed through probate, and El Corazon was now officially hers. The letter of formal notification had arrived two weeks ago, and now she could shut the door on this part of her life.

  Arden smoothed the letter open and read it for perhaps the tenth time.

  ‘Dear Miss Miller: I am pleased to inform you that...’

  Her eyes skimmed the page. Yes, it was true. The finca belonged to her now. Conor had lost his bid for it—if you could call the one effort he’d made at getting the codicil invalidated a ‘bid’. A grim smile touched Arden’s lips. Conor had threatened she’d be run over by a legal juggernaut but, in the end, he’d backed off.

  His lawyers had notified hers that he was going to fight the will, hers had fired back a reply warning that she was prepared to dig in her heels and fight—and, after a lengthy silence, Conor had surrendered.

  ‘My letter of intent convinced his legal staff of the strength of our case,’ Arden’s lawyer had wired proudly.

  Arden had let him think what he liked, but she’d known the truth, that it was Conor’s unremitting practicality that had won out over his hatred of her.

  ‘Attorneys are the only people who profit in cases like this,’ he’d said.

  And that, plain and simple, was why El Corazon was hers now, without a prolonged legal battle. She’d been right about Conor all along. He hadn’t wanted the finca so much as he’d wanted to avenge his father. And as for her—in the end, he hadn’t even hated her enough to squander money fighting her. She’d been a disturbance in his life, nothing more, nothing less. By now, he’d probably forgotten all about her, forgotten those nights she’d spent in his arms, forgotten all the things she would never forget...

  Arden’s breath hissed between her teeth.

  ‘Stop it,’ she said, her voice angry and sharp in the silence. ‘You’re behaving like a fool!’

  The ranch was hers now, hers and no one else’s, and—and...

  And she didn’t want it. Winning El Corazon had seemed a victory, but now she saw it for what it was, for what it always would be: a bittersweet reminder of pain and sorrow, an open wound that would never heal so long as she was mistress of El Corazon. But what choice did she have? She could sell it, of course, but the thought of knowing that someone other than Conor was riding that land was unsettling. It was crazy, of course, because she hated Conor with every breath she took, but that was the way she——

  ‘Wait a minute,’ she whispered. A little smile began curving across her lips. Conor had threatened Felix with some organisation when the old man had wanted to sell the cloud forest. What was it called? Friends of the Land? The Forest Conservers?

  ‘Friends of the Forest,’ she said delightedly, and her smile became a grin.

  By this time next week, she’d be free of El Corazon and all it stood for, forever.

  But it took longer than that even to set the wheels in motion.

  ‘I want to give El Corazon to Friends of the Forest,’ she told her attorney when she phoned him the next day.

  ‘What?’ he said. ‘We have a poor connection, señorita. I thought, for a moment, you said you wanted to give El Corazon to——’

  ‘That’s exactly what I said. Contact them, please, and draw up the necessary papers.’

  It was obvious he thought she’d lost her gringa mind. ‘You must think about this,’ he kept saying through phone call
after phone call, until Arden called the organisation herself and asked them if they’d be interested in being gifted with a hundred thousand plus acres of land in Costa Rica.

  Two months later, everything was in place. The phone lines had hummed between San José and New York, she had signed what seemed hundreds of papers, and now all that remained was the one final paper, the deed that would give El Corazon to the organisation for all time to come.

  The organisation’s secretary telephoned Arden at work late one Friday afternoon.

  ‘Our representative is in New York, Miss Miller,’ he said. ‘We hoped we could arrange a Press conference for tomorrow.’

  ‘No Press conference,’ she said firmly. ‘I thought I’d explained, I want this all done very quietly.’

  There was a brief pause. ‘Are you sure? This is quite a large gift, after all, and we should like to acknowledge your kindness in some way.’

  ‘Acknowledge it by keeping the finca as it is,’ she said. She closed her eyes, envisaging the horses grazing the dark green pastures, the rolling hills, and suddenly she saw Conor in her mind’s eye, Conor, carrying her into the shadowy coolness of a forest clearing. Her throat closed. ‘Just—just live up to your agreement,’ she said in a small, choked whisper. ‘Let El Corazon live on forever as it was, as it might have been...’

  ‘As it will always be,’ a soft, deep voice said.

  Arden’s head shot up and there was Conor, standing in the doorway of her office, wearing a dark suit, a white shirt and red silk tie, looking as urbane and sophisticated as the day she’d first learned his true identity. But she could sense the elemental man lurking just beneath the civilised veneer, the power and passion that marked him as the Master of El Corazon.

  The phone fell from her hand and clattered to the desk.

  ‘Conor?’ she breathed.

  He smiled as he walked towards her. ‘Hello, Arden.’

  She put her hands in her lap and laced the fingers together. ‘What—what are you doing here?’

  ‘You’ve lost weight,’ he said quietly, his gaze flickering over her.

  Get hold of yourself, Arden told herself fiercely.

  ‘Well,’ she said with a quick little smile, ‘you know what they say. You can never be too rich or too thin.’

  ‘But you can be, querida. You can be so rich you see money as power, as a whip you can use to beat people into submission.’ The muscle in his cheek knotted and unknotted. ‘Felix was a master of it.’

  ‘Is that why you came here? To talk about your uncle?’

  He stopped beside her desk, hung up the phone, then ran his hand lightly along her cheek. She caught her breath, fighting against the sudden, dizzying desire to press her mouth to his hand. ‘There are hollows here, beneath your cheekbones,’ he said softly. ‘Why have you lost so much weight, querida?’

  Her laughter was quick and brittle. ‘I told you, there’s no such thing as being too rich or too thin. Now that I’m rich——’

  ‘You are not rich, querida.’ His hand slid down her throat, whispered across her breast and paused above her racing heart. ‘Here, where it matters, you are as poor as I am.’

  Arden struck his hand away. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ she said sharply. ‘Anyway, I’m hardly “poor” any more—or have you forgotten that I won the fight for El Corazon?’

  ‘What fight? I didn’t oppose you.’

  ‘You were afraid of your own prophecy coming true.’

  His brow furrowed. ‘Prophecy?’

  ‘You knew you’d lose, Conor, and so you decided not to waste money on a bunch of low-life lawyers.’

  ‘You’re sure of that,’ he said with a little smile.

  ‘The only thing I’m not sure of is why you’ve come here.’

  He smiled again as he reached for her hand and drew her to her feet. ‘You know why.’

  ‘No,’ she insisted, ‘I don’t, but...’

  But what? He was looking at her as he had the day they’d gone to the fiesta, when he’d said he wanted to tell her something important and she, poor fool that she’d been, had thought he’d wanted to tell her he’d fallen in love with her. Oh, God, oh, God, let me stop remembering...

  Arden lifted her chin. ‘Are you trying to get me fired? Reception didn’t announce you—I don’t suppose you bothered with a pass. The company has rules against personal visitors.’

  ‘A visitor? Is that all I am, mi amor?’

  Arden’s heart skipped a beat. ‘Don’t—don’t call me that!’ she said unsteadily.

  ‘Why?’ He brought her hand to his mouth and kissed the palm. ‘In my heart, you are mi amor. You always will be.’

  ‘Linda,’ she said, the words tumbling uncontrolled from her lips in a fierce whisper. ‘Linda is your love, she’s...’

  She stared at him, horrified. What was she saying? What was she doing? She was making a fool of herself in front of this—this arrogant, deceitful, lying, cheating——

  And, all at once, she knew why he had come.

  ‘You know about El Corazon,’ she said slowly, her eyes on his.

  ‘That you’re giving it away? Yes.’

  “You’re unbelievable!’ Arden wrenched her hand free of his. ’Did you really think you could come here and—and sweet-talk me into changing my mind and giving you the finca instead?’

  ‘I came here to ask you a question, Arden.’ Conor leaned back against her desk, his arms folded over his chest. ‘Why did you decide to give away the ranch you so desperately wanted?’

  ‘Me?’ Arden laughed bitterly. ‘I never wanted El Corazon. You were the one who—’ She broke off in confusion, realising she’d said too much. ‘It’s none of your business,’ she said, starting past him, but Conor caught hold of her wrist and stopped her.

  ‘The day you ran away——’

  ‘I never ran away!’

  ‘You ran off, like a frightened child, querida.’ His mouth twisted. ‘And I reacted like a stubborn one and let you go.’

  ‘listen, Conor, this analysis is fascinating, but——’

  ‘That day, when you left me, you said you’d never wanted me, that it had been the ranch you’d wanted all along.’

  ‘I never said...’ He began to smile and she flushed. ‘You’re twisting everything that went on that day, dammit!’

  ‘Ah, mi amor.’ He bent his head and brushed his mouth lightly over hers. Arden jerked her head away, but not before her heart had given an agonizing leap. ‘We must do something about that wicked tongue of yours,’ he whispered softly, cupping her chin in his hand so that she had no choice but to meet his emerald gaze.

  ‘Conor, this won’t work. You’re trying to—to confuse me, to make me agree to give you the ranch, but——’

  ‘That was part of our trouble, sweetheart.’ He smiled and slipped his arms around her. ‘I was so positive I knew what you were up to, and you were absolutely certain you understood my every move.’

  She stiffened in his embrace. ‘I heard everything you and Linda said to each other that day. So if you’re going to try and pretend I misunderstood—’

  ‘Yes.’ His smile vanished. ‘It took months before I let my head do my thinking instead of my heart. When I did, I began to think you must have been in the hallway, listening to Linda.’

  ‘And to you,’ she said coldly.

  He nodded. ‘And to me—and misinterpreting every word.’

  ‘Listen, Conor, you’re wasting your time. I told you, I know what you want. You’re hoping you can convince me that—that you care for me, so that you can make me sign the ranch over to you, but——’

  ‘Why on earth would I do that,’ he asked, gently drawing her unyielding body closer to him, ‘when you’ve already done all the work for me?’

  Arden stared at him blankly. ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘I’m talking about all the red tape involved in giving the finca to Friends of the Forest, sweetheart.’ Conor linked his hands behind her back and grinned
. ‘Of course, I’d make my lawyers happy, duplicating all those documents, but——’

  ‘Duplicating what documents?’

  ‘Arden, mi amor, you’ve stolen my idea.’ He smiled, bent to her, and kissed her. ‘And I love you for it.’

  ‘Have you gone crazy, Conor? I don’t understand anything you’re saying!’

  ‘It’s very simple, querida. Do you remember the day of the fiesta? I made you sleep with me the entire night.’

  ‘You made a bet you knew I’d lose,’ she said, her cheeks flaming.

  ‘Only because I couldn’t bear the thought of not holding you in my arms, sweetheart—and because I knew that, the next morning, I would ask you to become my wife.’

  ‘Yes.’ Her heart felt like a piece of ice lying cold within her breast. ‘I heard you tell that to Linda.’

  ‘Of course I told it to Linda,’ he said impatiently. ‘I know you think she’s a spoiled brat——’

  ‘Hah!’

  ‘Perhaps she is—but she’s also an unhappy young woman. Don’t turn away from me, querida,’ he said, clasping her face in his hand. ‘Listen with your heart this time, imagine her not as she is now but as a little girl, eager for the love of a father—and having Felix turn away her every childish gesture of affection.’

  ‘So, she turned to you instead,’ Arden said coldly.

  ‘Yes, she did.’ His hand held her firmly, so she couldn’t look away from him. ‘And I loved her as she loved me, Arden, as brother and sister. I promised her I would always take care of her, that I would never abandon her.’

  ‘This is all interesting, Conor, but it has nothing to do with me. I’m not going to tumble back into bed with you, I’m not going to give you El Corazon—’

  ‘Dammit,’ he said gruffly, ‘haven’t you heard a word I said? I don’t want the ranch.’

  ‘You’ve always wanted it!’

  ‘Once, perhaps. But you made me see the truth: that I only wanted it to avenge my father.’ His hand slipped to the nape of her neck, his fingers burrowing into her hair. ‘I realised that, the day of the fiesta.’

  ‘That’s easy to say now, Conor, but why didn’t you tell me it then?’