“I don’t think it’ll have to come to that,” she said, slightly breathless.
“Pity,” Rey responded, his voice deep and intimate in the close confines of the car.
It was definitely time to get their conversation back onto a safer track, Rina decided and scoured her mind for something they could discuss without it entering into waters she had no desire to swim. Well, no right to swim anyway.
“Do you mind if I ask you something?” she said, keeping her voice light.
“Sure, what is it?”
“This curse your grandfather kept talking about. What’s it all about?”
“Ah, yes. Not one of our family’s best moments in history,” Rey replied enigmatically. “I tell you what. I’ll explain over our drinks, after we’ve done some dancing.”
“Dancing?”
“Didn’t I mention it? The restaurant is built over the water and the dance floor is one of the most popular in all of Puerto Seguro.”
Dancing she could handle, high heels or not. It was something both she and Sara loved and did equally well. Although, she hadn’t had the opportunity to indulge while she and Jacob had been together. He’d been uncomfortable on the dance floor and to keep him happy, she’d thought it was a small thing to forgo her own love of dancing. To be able to indulge tonight sent her pulse thrumming in anticipation.
“Sounds like fun,” she responded with a smile that stretched from ear to ear. She couldn’t wait.
And it was fun. Despite the relatively early hour for entertainment in the Med, the dance floor was crowded. To her delight, Rey was equally as skilled a dancer as her, even more so perhaps, she decided as he deftly twirled her out from his arms and back again in tune to the heady beat of the music playing from the discreetly placed speakers. She’d half expected the restaurant to be empty, being a week night, but the place was humming with activity. The tapas bar was doing a particularly fast trade on wines and beer and the delicious tapas menu which featured a lot of the local seafood as well as what Rey referred to as “foreign imports.”
By the time they found a table, overlooking the harbor, Rina was feeling far more relaxed.
“Phew, that was great. Thank you for bringing me here,” she said, catching her breath before taking a long, cold sip of the iced water that had just been delivered to their table. “De nada. We were supposed to come here the night before you went to France, remember? You’d been begging me for days.”
“Ah, yes, of course.” And just like that her happy mood shattered into a million shards. How many other metaphorical land mines would she step straight into before Sara came back? she wondered.
“Did you want to look at the tapas menu, or do you prefer to leave the choice in my hands?” Rey asked.
Rina waved a hand at the sheet he held between his long elegant fingers. “Oh, you go ahead. Surprise me.”
Rey beckoned to a waiter who came swiftly to take their order.
“And do you wish to have wine with your meal, also, señor?” the waiter asked politely.
“Sara? Do you want wine, or did you want to stay with your water?” Rey asked.
Rina had the impression he was expecting her to refuse wine. She thought it strange when she knew Sara enjoyed quality sparkling wines over anything else.
“Oh, wine, please. Do they have any of the Catalonian Cavas?”
There, even though her preference was for a full-bodied red, she could be more like Sara if she needed to be. She’d even remembered the district Sara had mentioned, in one of her e-mails, where she’d discovered a new favorite. Rey raised an eyebrow at her and placed the order with the waiter who nodded before leaving them at the table.
“I was beginning to wonder if there was something wrong. You haven’t taken wine for a couple of weeks now.”
“Me? Oh, no. I’m fit as a horse.” Rina tried to keep a smile plastered on her face.
Sara had stopped drinking wine? That wasn’t like her at all. Maybe Rey was right. When Rina saw her at the airport, Sara had been a bit off-color. Ah, well, hopefully she would be able to get to the root of everything when she finally caught up with her twin. Rina settled back into her seat and decided a subject change was definitely in order. It was all too easy to slip unwarily into dangerous waters, like the wine.
“You were going to tell me about the curse?” she prompted.
“Ah, yes, the curse.” Rey sighed and leaned back in his chair, fixing his gaze at something in the distance across the harbor. “As I said before, it is not one of my family’s greatest moments. In fact, most of us would quite happily forget about the whole thing, but for some reason Abuelo has become fixated on the topic. It would probably be of benefit to all of us if you understood the background and helped to head him off from his ramblings.”
“Is it really that bad?” Rina asked, leaning forward to prop her elbows on the table and rest her chin on interlaced fingers.
Rey snorted. “As bad as it gets, though I have nothing else to compare it to. So, where to begin?”
“At the beginning, I suppose,” she encouraged softly. “Who made the curse, and why?”
“That bit’s easy. Three hundred years ago, one of my ancestors hired a governess to teach his three daughters. It’s the old story, I suppose. His wife was often sickly, and largely absent from his daily life. The governess was young and beautiful. The Baron was handsome and virile—a typical del Castillo trait,” he teased.
Rina felt her lips curve in an answering smile and she rolled her eyes at him. “And was he modest, too? Another del Castillo trait, I suppose?”
“Oh, of course.” Rey’s smile widened. “Anyway, to cut a long story short, over the years, he fathered three sons with her. At the same time, his long-suffering wife bore him three more daughters. He was determined to acknowledge his male heirs—his infant sons from the governess. So he forced his wife to acknowledge them as her own children, while substituting the girls for the governess’s babes.
“As a token of his esteem for his lover, and as the only way he could show his thanks for the gift of his sons, he set her up in the cottage where you now stay and gave her a necklace set with a massive ruby, known as La Verdad del Corazon.”
“The Heart’s Truth? Have I got that right?”
“Sí, it was a family heirloom.”
“He must have loved her very much to give her the necklace.”
“Well, that is under dispute. Apparently, the necklace—or more particularly the stone itself—was supposed to represent the family’s strength and prosperity. It was a gift which was to be endowed upon each new bride. Why he gave it to his lover, well, that is anyone’s guess.”
“Why is it under dispute? Surely the fact he gave it to her should be enough proof of his love?”
“One would have thought so, however when the boys were in their teens, the baron’s wife died and he entered into a new marriage contract with a woman from a high-ranking French family. Some say it was for financial and political gain, but there was no need, then, for him to continue to advance the family fortunes. He was already the wealthiest man on Isla Sagrado, and one of the wealthiest in all of Spain and France.”
“He married someone else?” Rina was shocked. “After she’d waited for him all that time?”
“Ah, I see you’re a romantic at heart. You think he, a Baron, should have married his daughters’ governess?”
“Well, of course he should!”
Reynard shook his head gently. “Such was not the way of things then. A commoner, while good enough to warm the sheets of the noble classes, could never marry above their station.”
“That’s just disgusting.” Rina reached for the glass of cava that had appeared during Rey’s storytelling. “He owed it to her.”
“Well, it appears she felt much as you do. According to legend, she was apparently crazed with grief at what she saw as his betrayal, so she broke into the wedding festivities at the castillo and publicly accused the Baron of stealing her sons. Of
course, he decried her statement but what is said to have made matters worse was her own sons refuting her claim as well—saying she was not their mother. She became uncontrollable and the Baron ordered his soldiers to take her below the castillo, to the cliff caves where cells were kept for unfortunates such as her.
“But before they could drag her away she cursed the Baron and his children, all nine of them, swearing that if in nine generations they could not learn to marry and live their lives by honor, truth and love, the family and all its branches would die out forever.”
“She cursed her own children?”
Rey shrugged. “She was mad, what can I say?”
“Driven mad, more like. And then to have her own flesh and blood turn their backs on her?” Rina nodded slowly. “I can see why she’d have done it. But I imagine she regretted it with every bone in her body.”
“We will never know if she felt regret. They say she broke free of her captors once they reached the tunnels below the castillo and ran down one in particular that led to an opening in the cliff face above the rocks. The legend says that as the soldiers closed in behind her, she ripped La Verdad del Corazon from her neck and cast it into the sea, saying it would only return to the family once the curse was broken. Then she followed the necklace into the savage ocean below.”
“Oh, no. That’s awful.”
“Tragic, yes. Her body was washed up by the waves within days, but the necklace was never seen again.”
“And her curse? Has it really happened?”
Rey shrugged. “Who is to say if she has seen her wishes come true or not? The family lines have certainly diminished over the past three hundred years. But that is only normal given the circumstances of wars, ill health and general bad luck. From the direct line of the sons, reputed to be hers—remember, there is no proof—only Abuelo, Alex, Benedict and myself remain. And my brothers and I are the ninth generation.”
“Honor, truth and love. Those are the words on your family crest aren’t they?” Rina took another sip of her wine, enjoying the dance of bubbles across her tongue before she swallowed.
“They are. I didn’t know you’d seen that,” Rey nodded.
“I saw it on the doors to your office, the day of Benedict’s accident. I suppose it makes sense that she’d have chosen those three provisos if she felt her lover had not abided by them. So, have you?”
“Have I what?”
“Have you abided by them? Is the curse broken?”
Eight
She had the nerve to sit there and judge him? Rey bit back his instinctive response and schooled his features into a pleasant smile.
“Now what would make you think we del Castillos would live any other way?”
Sara—no, Sarina, he corrected himself—twirled the long stemmed champagne flute on the tabletop in front of her, eyeing him from beneath her long, dark lashes as if considering her reply very carefully. As well she should, he thought. She wasn’t who she said she was, so she could hardly harp on about truth now, could she?
“Well, I was just thinking about what the governess said and how she phrased her curse. It’s as if she wanted to remind her lover of his family’s creed. Clearly, she felt he had not lived by it.”
“She had gone mad. Who knows what she was thinking any more? Now, enough of history.” Rey leaned forward and fixed her with a stare. “How about you tell me a little about your family? We’ve had so little opportunity to learn about ourselves beyond the obvious. I think it’s time we got to know one another a little better, don’t you?”
Her pupils dilated somewhat, before settling back to normal—the only visible sign of any fear. Oh, she was very good at this, he reluctantly acknowledged. If his suspicions hadn’t been roused and if the damning information on the Internet hadn’t been available, he’d never have suspected any different.
“What do you want to know?”
She was hedging; he knew it as surely as he knew the sun rose and fell each day. He reached across the table and gathered her left hand in his, his thumb gently swinging the diamond solitaire he’d put on her sister’s finger, back and forth.
“Siblings? Parents? What sort of things did you get up to growing up?”
To his surprise she smiled. “One sibling—a sister, one surviving parent and mischief, generally. What about you?”
So she was already trying to turn the tide of conversation back to him. He hid his irritation behind a laugh.
“Oh, mischief also, most definitely. My parents died in an avalanche many years ago. Abuelo had the joy of seeing my brothers and me through our teenage years. No doubt that has aged him unfairly.”
“I doubt that. If anything, I would imagine trying to keep you three in line kept him youthful. And from the way he is with you and your brothers, I’m sure he wouldn’t have it any other way. I am very sorry to hear you lost your parents so young, though.”
“Thank you. What about you? Tell me about your parents.” It would be too obvious if he asked about her sister right away—he wanted to ease her in to it. Get her to open up, let her guard down, perhaps show her true colors.
She smiled and her eyes took on a faraway look. “For as long as I can remember, they were constantly competing with one another. I suppose, to an outsider, it was a rather strange marriage but it seemed to work for them. They fed on one another’s need to be the best at everything. I think that’s why they encouraged my sister and me into competitive sport. Winning was everything. It didn’t matter if it was a game of cards, or the best vegetables, sport or anything. Sometimes they worked together to win against someone else, sometimes apart to compete against one another.
“It wasn’t always…easy at home. Anyway, Dad died suddenly a couple of years ago, complications from pneumonia. It came as a heck of a shock to us all but while Mum still grieves for him, she’s come to accept his death—and, with him gone, there’s no further fierce competition. She seems more settled than she did before. Happier to take life at a slower pace, I guess.”
“And your sister? What is she doing?”
Sarina’s lips parted and she started to speak but then hesitated. Obviously gathering her thoughts together.
“This and that. She was recently engaged but it didn’t work out.”
That was interesting—the newspaper article he’d read gave the impression that she was still engaged. Was she lying? No, it seemed more likely that the engagement had truly ended—perhaps because she didn’t manage to successfully fleece the poor idiot who’d asked her to marry him, Rey thought.
“She’s been working as a kind of Girl Friday for the past couple of years, basically a problem solver for people—she has a knack for sorting things out, raising business profiles where necessary and creating calm where there’s chaos—she’s a bit of a Jill of all trades, but I think she’s ready for a change now.”
“You two are close?”
“Very close,” she agreed and reached for her nearly empty wine glass.
“More wine?” he asked. Perhaps he could encourage her to be less guarded with her responses if she had a little more to drink.
“Thank you, that would be lovely.”
Their waiter chose that moment to return to their table with a selection of the local tapas the restaurant specialized in. Reynard chose several of them and after the waiter set the dishes out, and explained each one in turn, he took their order for another glass of Cava for Sarina and a Tempranillo for Reynard.
He nodded his acceptance to the waiter before leaning forward to select a crisp golden croquette and hold it to Sarina’s lips.
“Here, try this. I think you’ll like it.”
She obediently opened her mouth and he popped the tiny croquette inside, allowing her lips to close over his fingers before he withdrew them. He saw the surprise on her face at his lingering touch on her lips before the flavors of the morsel of food exploded in her mouth. An expression of sheer pleasure crossed her face, an expression not unlike that of a woman deep in the
throes of lovemaking. Despite his simmering anger, passion pooled deep in his gut, sending blood to one particular extremity where it pulsed with demanding need. He’d been a fool to be taken in by her pretense for so long. He should have known from the first moment he had touched her that she wasn’t Sara. While the twins were uncannily identical, his response to the two of them couldn’t be more different. The woman he’d proposed to had never fired his blood the way the woman sitting before him now did with every gesture, every touch.
“That is divine,” she said after a few moments. “What was it, again?”
“Croquetas de gambas, translated, prawn croquettes.”
He was relieved she’d finished the morsel. Watching her eat it, watching the cascade of delight pass across her features, had been a torture all in itself.
“I think I like the Spanish term best. Hmm, croquetas de gambas. Yes, I like the way it rolls off the tongue almost as much as it rolls onto it.”
Rey helped himself to one of the minicroquettes and let his teeth sink into the crispy coating before the soft filling spilled across his taste buds. Yes, he could understand why she’d gone into such raptures over the snack. It was truly delicious.
“You’ve got a crumb, just there.”
Sarina reached across the table and wiped the bottom edge of his lip with her thumb, her touch leaving a flame of heat against his skin. She sat back suddenly, her eyes a little glazed. Had she felt that same burn along her skin as he had? He hoped so. She deserved as much torment as he could possibly put her through.
“Thanks,” he said, with a slow smile calculated to both put her at ease with the intimacy of her touch and her reaction to it.
He steered the conversation into more desultory topics as they enjoyed the rest of the tapas selection. She had one more glass of wine, while he nursed his single glass, mindful of the dinner he had planned back at the apartment, the necessity to keep a clear head. Aside from the importance of keeping his wits about him while he figured out her angle, he also had to be sober enough to drive her home to the cottage again tonight.
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