But that was the wild delirium talking. It was the sort of hungry fantasy that her mind had thrown at her at the height of ecstasy, when she could believe that all her dreams could possibly come true. Now she was sinking back into cold reality. And cold reality saw things so very differently.
It was almost as if he had decided that this was the end. That he had waited long enough and, as things were not going the way he had planned, then he had decided that he was going to call the whole thing off.
And after the moment of glorious delusion, the moment when she had thought things were so won-drously possible, the cruel disappointment was like a set of savage talons clawing at her heart. The anguish was all the worse because there was no way she could express it, no way she could admit to Raul that she had been foolish enough to allow herself to believe …
‘What is it?’ Raul had sensed her withdrawal, the change of mood that kept her distant, held her body stiffly away from his instead of cuddling close in the aftermath of ecstasy. ‘Now what’s wrong?’
His tone caught on the edge of painfully exposed nerves, pushing her into wild, unconsidered speech.
‘I was wondering how long all this is going to go on. When it’s going to end.’
Beside her he stiffened in his turn, the long, powerful body losing the indolent relaxation of fulfilment, every muscle tensing like those of a wild animal sensing an invader coming unwanted into its territory.
‘Who says it has to end at all?’
He was half sitting now, propped up on one elbow, his head resting on one hand. Alannah knew he was looking at her but she refused to meet his eyes, staring fixedly instead straight up at the white-painted ceiling.
‘Well, we both know it has to finish some time—there’s nothing really to keep us together, and we both know that. I’m just a womb you’re renting for nine months, and then when you’re done …’
‘When I’m done, que?’ Raul murmured with a darkly ironical edge to the question. ‘When I’m done then do you think I will discard you like an empty husk, when I have enjoyed the sweetness of the nut inside the shell and sated myself on it?’
It was what she feared most so for a moment she didn’t dare to answer but simply turned a furious glare in his direction. A furious, sightless glare. She didn’t dare to look into his shuttered, watchful face for fear of what she might read there. She might know that she was speaking the truth but she didn’t want to see it in his expression, read it in his eyes.
‘I don’t know, do I?’ she said at last when he was obviously determined to wait for her to answer. ‘I don’t know what’s going on in that head of yours. Why don’t you tell me what you have planned?’
‘What I have planned …’
Raul got up from the bed and wandered over to the window, staring out at the mountains on the horizon just as Alannah had done such a short time before. And now, with his long, straight back to her and with the heat of passion cooling as swiftly as the sheen of perspiration on her skin, she suddenly felt a terrible twist of fear clench in her heart as she wished the foolish question back.
‘What I have planned is a wedding.’
It was the last thing she was expecting and the words swung round and round in her head, repeating themselves over and over but never making any clearer sense at all.
What I have planned is a wedding. But why? Why now? When there was no sign of the baby he was marrying her for?
Turning, he snatched up the bouquet of roses from the chair onto which they had fallen and tossed them towards her in an angry gesture, heedless of any damage he might do to the delicate petals as they landed on the bed.
‘That was why I bought these. When I was in Madrid today I finalised all the arrangements. Everything is in hand and all you have to do is to choose your dress and come to the church on the right day.’
‘And when is the right d-day?’ Alannah stammered, totally unable to believe she was hearing right. Had he really arranged the wedding? Was he really going to marry her? Even without the baby?
‘The fourteenth,’ Raul told her flatly, stunning her even more. ‘You have just two weeks before you become Dona Raul Marquez Marcín.’
CHAPTER ELEVEN
THE night air was still and warm after the intense heat of the day as Alannah wandered through the shadowy grounds of the castillo, knowing that, late as it was, there was no point at all in going back to her room. There was no way she was going to be able to sleep; not tonight.
‘Get plenty of rest, darling,’ had been her mother’s last words to her as she kissed her goodnight. ‘You want to look your very best tomorrow.’
The rest was an impossibility, Alannah knew, and as for looking her very best for the wedding—well, that wasn’t something she had come to a decision about yet. And that was why she was now wandering restlessly around the moonlit grounds, trying to force herself to make up her mind. Besides, she had the miserable suspicion that if she went back and got into bed then as soon as the light was out and she was lying in the darkness the tears would start—and she was very much afraid that she wouldn’t be able to make them stop.
Tomorrow was her wedding day. Within less than fourteen hours she was expected to have done her hair and make-up, slipped into the beautiful, delicate gown that Raul had arranged for a world-famous designer to create and produce for her at the speed of light, and be ready to step into the chauffeur-driven limo, to be taken to the huge mediaeval cathedral at Léon, where Raul was waiting to take her as his bride.
And that was the problem.
How could she marry Raul when she knew he didn’t love her?
For the baby, he would have said. But only this morning she had had undeniable proof that once again her body had let her down. The familiar ache low down in her pelvis had been followed, with cruel inevitability, by the arrival of her period.
Once again there was no hope of a baby very soon.
And without that hope, how could she go through a ceremony to become Raul’s wife, taking vows she would mean to keep, when she knew that he would never feel the same?
She had told herself that she could do it, that she would manage to cope. But now, with the day very nearly here, the wild, whirling panic of her thoughts told her that she couldn’t go through with it.
And still she had chickened out of telling him. She had let him move his things into another room for tonight, in deference to her mother’s superstitious conviction that it was bad luck for the groom to see his bride before the wedding, and she had accepted his kiss with a cool equanimity that she was far from feeling. And she hadn’t found the courage to even try to tell him the truth.
Now, with midnight fast approaching, everyone in the castillo was sound asleep, dreaming of the coming ceremony, and she was on her own, wandering miserably through the darkness, knowing that it didn’t matter if Raul saw her before the wedding or not, the true bad luck had already jinxed this marriage before it had even begun.
‘Couldn’t you sleep either?’
The voice, low, masculine and instantly familiar, made her start as it came to her on the night air, apparently from nowhere.
‘Who?’
Whirling, she stared round into the darkness in bewilderment, unable to see who had spoken.
‘Raul?’
‘Here.’
From the shadows under a tall tree another shadow detached itself, vague and almost invisible, Raul’s black hair and black clothing blending with the darkness of the night. Only the lighter tone of his skin caught the glimmering rays of the moon, making it visible—just—as he took a couple of steps forward into the light.
‘What—what are you doing here?’
There was a distinct quaver on the words, Raul noted, but just what had put it there? It was impossible to tell how she was feeling and her face, wide-eyed and desperately pale in the moonlight, gave nothing away.
Nothing except that she was in total shock at seeing him there. And that was only to be expected, after all. After they h
ad said goodnight an hour ago she must have thought that he was safely tucked up in a bed at the opposite end of the castillo. Hopefully asleep, or if not then so deep in his own preparations for tomorrow that he would never notice she had set out on a midnight ramble.
‘I came to find you.’
‘But …’
Alannah pushed one hand through the tumble of soft hair, its colour drained by the bluish light of the moon, and he would have to have been totally blind not to see the way it shook, the effort she was having to make to try to control her reaction.
So was it a response to him that made her feel this way—or the knowledge of what she had planned?
Whatever she did have planned. Just for a moment his fingers touched the pocket of his jeans where a small sheet of folded paper was hidden. She didn’t know that he had it in his possession, and he wasn’t going to let her know, not until he had some better idea of just what was going on inside her lovely head.
‘Why—how did you know I was here?’ Alannah managed, every stumble of her tongue, every abruptly broken-off word setting his teeth on edge even more. Did she not know how much she was giving away—the way she was making it blatantly obvious that something was very wrong?
But what? One part of him wanted to push him into demanding to know right away, to get her to tell him now before he went out of his mind with impatience. But another, more rational part, warned him to wait, to take his time to find out and not to rush her into saying something he might not want to know.
‘I came to your room. I wanted to talk to you, but as your mother had set a careful curfew I didn’t get a chance until she had gone to bed.’
Somehow he managed to inject a lightness into his voice that he was very far from feeling and, hearing it, he saw her relax slightly, her tense shoulders dropping, her clenched fingers loosening.
‘What did you want to talk to me about?’
‘Let’s walk a little before I tell you. There’s something I want you to see.’
She fell into step beside him as he set off along the path, walking alongside, but just keeping enough distance so that he would have to make a real thing of reaching for her hand if he wanted to hold it.
He decided to leave that for now. He didn’t want to make a real thing of it—not till he found out more. Once again his fingers brushed over his pocket, hearing the faint crackle of the paper inside.
‘Where are we going?’
She still sounded edgy; worse than ever, in fact, though she was trying very hard to erase the tension from her voice.
‘Not very far. In fact—here we are.’
‘Here?’
This time it was blank bewilderment that sounded in the word. He could see her eyes flashing faintly as she looked around for something that he might have brought her to see.
‘What…?’
Raul lifted one booted foot and rested it on the hollow trunk of a fallen tree that lay almost hidden by the side of the path.
‘This. I wanted you to see my special place. This was where I used to come and sit when I was a kid—still do now. It was also where I hid when things went wrong.’
Stooping, he peered down into the darkness of the huge hole inside the trunk.
‘Believe it or not I could get in there once. I wouldn’t like to try it now.’
He watched the play of emotions flit across her face, wariness fading into amusement, understanding and finally into uncertainty. And it was uncertainty that held when she looked up at him as he straightened again.
‘I hid in there when they came to tell me that Rodrigo had died.’
She had been about to speak but his words stopped her dead. Twice she opened her mouth and both times she closed it again without managing to make a sound. But he knew the question she wanted to ask.
‘He was my brother.’
That brought a gasp, a shake of her head as if in disbelief.
‘I didn’t know.’
‘My father never wanted anyone to speak about him. When we lost him, it was as if he had never existed. He caught meningitis and no one realised in time. He was only ill for a couple of days.’
‘How—how old was he?’
‘Just six. And I was four.’
‘You were the younger brother! But I thought …’
‘You thought that I was always the heir to all this …’
With one lean brown hand he gestured to take in all the land that surrounded them, the darkened castillo in the distance.
‘But no. I was the second son—until Rodrigo died. Then I took on the role—and I was always taught that it was my duty to provide another heir …’
He had hoped that that would help her understand. But whatever reaction he had expected, it was not the one he got. Instead Alannah flung up her hands before her face and whirled away as if in shock.
‘Oh, no! No! That’s not going to happen. I can’t go through with this … I can’t! Raul, I am not going to marry you!’
So it was as bad as he’d thought. Worse. He’d feared as much since he had gone to her room and found it empty. It was as he’d been about to turn, to go to hunt for her somewhere else, that he’d seen the single sheet of paper on the writing desk. And his name at the top.
‘Dear Raul … I’m sorry …’
‘OK …’
He forced himself to pitch it at calm and indifferent, almost throw-away. He wasn’t going to make this any harder than it had to be.
Harder for her. He’d known it was coming, so he could handle it—for now. And then when she’d gone—as it was obvious that she was going to go now …
OK?
OK?
Alannah couldn’t believe what she was hearing. She felt as if her heart was going to burst from the pain of that single word, the supreme indifference with which Raul threw it at her. She’d told him that she was not going to marry him—that she couldn’t—and all he could say was …
OK.
She’d always known that he didn’t love her, but she had thought that his desire for her might merit more than that. His desire for her, and his desire for a Marcín heir, the desire she now understood so much more than ever before—surely they would at least have made him raise a protest? Made him command her to stay, declare as he once had that he wouldn’t let her go?
No. Memory came back to her in a rush, amending that line, changing a single word. And it seemed that that single word made all the difference in the world.
‘You can run but you’ll never get away.’ Raul’s voice echoed inside her head. ‘I’ll come after you. I can’t let you go.’
I can’t let you go.
Not I won’t let you go—but I can’t …
It was as if someone had just rewired her brain and suddenly she was looking back, seeing things she’d never seen before, making connections …
She had heard that tone of voice before. Two weeks ago. In their room. On the day that he had brought her the roses.
‘Raul,’ she said slowly, still thinking, still working it out, ‘why did you feel you had to buy me roses?’
She had thought he might not follow her but apart from a quick frown there was no hesitation. He understood the time that she meant.
‘Because I was going to tell you that I’d arranged the wedding—and I didn’t feel that I had to. I wanted to.’
‘You’d never bought me flowers before.’
‘I know.’
He pushed his hands deep into his pockets, paced the length of the hollow tree trunk, shoulders hunched as if against some burden that had suddenly fallen on them. At the end of the tree he paused, turned back to face her. In the moonlight his face was pale and set into rigid, defensive lines.
Defensive lines.
‘And that was the whole point. I wanted to try and start again. Do the whole damn proposal over again. Go down on one knee if need be—and give you the flowers …’
Something in her face had alerted him, made him aware of just what he was saying. He ground to a halt, c
lamping his mouth tight shut over what he had been about to say next.
‘Oh, Raul, please! Please don’t stop there! It was just getting interesting!’
‘No.’
It was a low, angry growl but she could hear the way that it was coming ragged at the edges and she decided she could take the risk of trying to ignore it. If she was wrong, then she had nothing left to lose after all. But if she was right then she had everything to win.
‘Yes!’ she said, praying she sounded more determined than she actually felt.
Moving quickly to his side, she caught his hand and drew him down with her until they were both sitting on the log.
‘Yes. You have to tell me what you were going to say—it’s important.’
Was it just the effect of the moonlight or were there deep shadows in his eyes that she had never seen there before? She could only wait and see and pray that if they were there then they meant what she hoped they did.
‘You were going to go down on one knee …’ she prompted when he still hesitated and for one terrible moment she thought that he wasn’t going to let her push him.
But then abruptly he seemed to come to a decision. The broad shoulders lifted in a dismissive shrug and he started to speak, slowly at first but then gathering pace until the words were tumbling out of him in a hurrying stream.
‘I was going to ask you to marry me all over again—but properly this time. I would have gone down on one knee if I needed to—begged you to marry me if I’d needed to.’
‘Because of …’ Alannah began but the wild, almost desperate shake of his dark head made her break off hastily, knowing that what was to come was vitally important.
‘Not just because of the baby, or our families, but for me—because I couldn’t live without you. I love you—I’ve always loved you, right from the start. Even when I thought I hated you for walking out on me, I knew it wasn’t the truth. It was still love but love that got messed up, twisted along the way. I didn’t want things to go on as they were with your believing I only wanted you for sex or because I had to provide my father with an heir. It had to be because I wanted you here, beside me, for the rest of my life.’
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