His jaw clenched. ‘Yes.’
‘Well, isn’t that just convenient?’ Her eyes flashed darkly. ‘Unfortunately I don’t have your selective memory.’
Raphael ground his back teeth together before speaking. ‘There is absolutely nothing wrong with my memory, Beth.’
‘Then—’
‘Do you not understand I have a job to do?’ Raphael rasped harshly as he gave up all pretence of politeness in the face of Beth’s dogged determination to have this conversation—whether he wished it or not. ‘And I cannot do that job properly, cannot protect you in the way that you need to be protected, if my thoughts are distracted by images of making love with you! There—does that answer your question?’ He glared his displeasure as a nerve pulsed in his tightly clenched jaw.
‘As a matter of fact, it does.’ She relaxed back against the table edge as she looked across the kitchen at him challengingly. ‘It distracts you to think of the two of us making love together?’
Raphael drew in a harsh breath. ‘Yes!’
‘It distracts me, too,’ she admitted huskily.
His eyes narrowed. ‘You—’
‘Raphael—’
‘You will do me the courtesy of allowing me to finish,’ he rasped impatiently.
‘But—’
‘Beth!’ He bit out his frustration.
‘Fine.’ Beth held up her hands in defeat. ‘I was only going to tell you that the steaks are on fire, but if you aren’t inter—’ She broke off with a grin as Raphael turned and began swearing as he saw the flames and smoke coming out of the grill pan. ‘Don’t worry,’ she added lightly as he pulled the pan out onto the trivet before beating the flames out with the tea towel. ‘I’ve always preferred my steaks well done, anyway!’
Raphael shot her a venomous glance. ‘I have not.’
‘Poor you,’ she murmured dryly.
‘Can we just get this meal over and done with?’ Raphael all but threw the two steaks onto the waiting plates. ‘I have work to do this evening.’
Beth pulled out a chair and sat down. ‘Anything I can help you with?’ If she were at home then she could have spent the evening with friends, or catching up on housework, maybe even watching one of her favourite DVDs, but she had no idea what she was supposed to do with the rest of her evening stuck out here in the wilds of Hampshire.
‘I think you have “helped” me quite enough for one evening!’ Raphael pulled out the chair opposite before folding his long length down onto it.
‘If you’re sure…’ Beth helped herself to salad before pushing the bowl across the table to him.
‘I am very sure.’
She nodded as she cut off a piece of steak before popping it into her mouth and chewing with obvious enjoyment for several seconds. ‘Mmm, this steak is delicious.’
Raphael wasn’t fooled for a moment by the innocence of Beth’s expression as she looked across the table at him, knew, by the laughter gleaming in the darkness of her eyes and the half-smile on those thoroughly kissed lips, that her earlier bad humour had now evaporated and she was enjoying herself. At his expense.
‘My father would weep if he could see how I have massacred his precious beef,’ he muttered disgustedly as he pushed the burnt offering to the side of his plate.
‘Your father’s beef?’
Raphael nodded. ‘Cesar has it flown here from Argentina.’
‘Your father farms cattle?’ she prompted lightly.
Raphael gave her a derisive glance. ‘Cattle are not farmed in Argentina, they are ranched. By gauchos.’
Beth had seen photos in magazines of gauchos; men as hard and rugged as the terrain they worked on. ‘And your father works on a ranch in Argentina?’
His jaw tightened as he seemed to realise he had once again been drawn into talking about his family. ‘On the pampas, yes.’
‘That’s very rough countryside, isn’t it?’
‘Very,’ Raphael acknowledged tersely, that stern set to his jaw telling Beth that he would not be drawn on the subject any further than that.
‘Does—? Oh, damn, I forgot the wine!’ She gave him an apologetic grimace as she stood up, having opened a bottle of red wine when she first came down to the kitchen in order to let it breathe, as Grace had shown her. ‘Here, maybe it will help your steak go down!’ She sat down to pour wine into one of the two empty glasses on the table before filling her own and then placing the bottle in the middle of the table.
‘I doubt anything would succeed in making this shoe leather palatable!’ Raphael muttered disgustedly as he lifted the glass to his lips and took a sip of the wine.
There was absolutely no way of missing the way that he stilled the moment he tasted the wine before slowly swallowing. ‘Is there something wrong with it?’ Beth prompted warily as she paused after sipping her own wine; Grace might have shown her how to remove the cork from a bottle of wine, and how to chill a white wine, and allow a bottle of red to breathe before drinking it, but differentiating between a good and a cheap and nasty wine was still beyond Beth’s palate.
Raphael carefully replaced his glass down on the table. ‘Where did you get this from?’
‘The rack near the kitchen door. Which was why I assumed it was okay to use. Please tell me I haven’t opened some priceless and irreplaceable bottle of wine that Cesar has been nurturing as an investment, or saving for a special occasion!’ She wasn’t feeling in the least reassured by the bleakness of Raphael’s expression.
Raphael affected a neutral expression as he reached out to pick up the bottle and look at the label. As he had thought, it bore the Cordoba name. His name. From his family vineyard.
‘Raphael?’
He forced the tension from his shoulders as he glanced across the table at the anxiously watching Beth. ‘No, you have not opened a priceless bottle of wine,’ he drawled reassuringly as he replaced the bottle carefully back onto the table. ‘I had forgotten that Cesar is partial to this particular red wine with his steak, that is all.’ He gave a shake of his head.
Beth reached out and picked up the bottle, a frown appearing between her eyes as she read the name on the label. ‘A relative of yours?’
Raphael gave a humourless smile. ‘My father.’
She sat back against the chair. ‘But I thought you said your father was a gaucho?’
‘I said he ranched cattle,’ Raphael corrected dryly.
‘But I thought— He owns the ranch,’ Beth realised with a frown, ‘and no doubt has gauchos who work for him? Just as he owns the vineyard where this wine came from?’
He gave a grimace. ‘Yes.’
‘Your family is wealthy?’
His mouth twisted derisively. ‘Nowhere near the Navarros’ fortune, but, yes, the Cordoba family is wealthy.’
‘I had assumed—’ She blinked. ‘Assumption obviously being the mother of all—’
‘Beth!’ he cut in warningly.
She gave him an impatient glare. ‘Well, you have to admit, Raphael, it’s a little unusual, to find the heir to a ranch and an obviously successful vineyard working as Head of Security for someone else, even if that someone else is as close to you as a brother.’
A nerve pulsed in Raphael’s tightly clenched jaw. ‘Not if that is what that person chooses to do.’
‘But you’re the son and heir, so why aren’t you working on the ranch or vineyard with your father?’
‘I do not believe I have to answer that.’
‘Why not, when it’s a perfectly valid question in the circumstances?’
Beth could have no idea of the circumstances surrounding Raphael’s reasons for leaving his home and his family fifteen years ago, and moving to Buenos Aires to stay with the Navarros. Nor did he have any intention of confiding in her as to the unacceptable—and persistent—sexual advances of his father’s second wife which, when discovered, had resulted in his father believing her claims that she hadn’t wanted to tell him but Raphael had been pestering her to have sex with him for months be
hind his back. It was perhaps that last detail that hurt Raphael the most. That, at the time, his father had chosen to believe his wife’s version of events rather than that of his own son…
Raphael looked at Beth coolly. ‘Perhaps because I do not make a habit of confiding my…personal family business with people I have only just met.’
Beth drew her breath in sharply. Was that how Raphael thought of her, as merely a person he had just met? And why should he think of her in any other way? Because they had shared a few kisses and intimacies earlier this evening? Albeit intimacies that Beth had never allowed with another man…
What had happened between the two of them earlier might have been unique in Beth’s limited physical experience, but it certainly wasn’t in Raphael’s. In fact, the opposite, if his expertise in that area was any indication. It was also an incident he had told her he would rather they both forgot…
‘You’re right, Raphael, this steak really is inedible.’ She gave him a tight smile as she stood up. ‘I think I’ll go to bed now. I’m feeling rather tired after all the travelling today. Leave all this.’ She waved a hand towards the mess on the table. ‘I’ll clear it away in the morning.’
Raphael recognised the lie for what it was. ‘You have not eaten anything.’
‘I’m no longer hungry.’ Her eyes flashed darkly as she looked challengingly across the kitchen at him.
He scowled darkly. ‘Why are you making such a fuss over something that is basically none of your business?’
Her chin rose as she gave a humourless smile. ‘Glad to see you haven’t lost your brutal honesty—in regard to some subjects, at least!’
Raphael winced. ‘It was not my intention to be brutal—’
‘Then I’ll know to stay well out of your way when it is,’ Beth came back with hard derision. ‘What time are we leaving for London in the morning?’
He frowned his displeasure with the change of subject. ‘I thought seven-thirty.’
‘I should make it seven o’clock.’ She frowned. ‘The London traffic can be awful at that time of the morning.’
‘I will inform Edward,’ he confirmed tersely.
The golden swathe of her hair fell forward over her shoulders as Beth nodded. ‘Goodnight, Raphael, and don’t work too hard,’ she added dryly before leaving.
‘Goodnight, Beth…’ Raphael murmured softly as he stared at the doorway Beth had disappeared through.
As he continued to wonder, long after Beth must have reached her bedroom, exactly how they were going to proceed during the long days or weeks ahead.
Having decided, after that unforgivable incident in the gym earlier this evening, that he had to maintain his distance from Beth in future, Raphael now deeply regretted having told her the little about his family that he had.
Regretted having ever met the disturbing Beth Blake at all…
CHAPTER SIX
‘I’VE NEVER SEEN anyone so dark and broodingly gorgeous in my entire life!’
‘Gorgeous? The man is sex on two long, perfectly muscled legs!’
‘And did you see the size of those shoulders…?’
‘It’s the size of his feet you have to look at, silly.’
‘Going to let me in on the secret, ladies?’ Beth had strolled over to look enquiringly at the three giggling women who worked in her office as they gathered conspiratorially around the coffee machine during the morning break.
‘I can do better than that. Come and look out of the window!’ Kathy grabbed hold of her arm and dragged her across the room to where the windows looked directly down into the street three floors below. ‘See!’ she announced triumphantly. ‘He was standing right there when we all came into work this morning.’
Beth should have guessed what—and who!—was causing this uproar amongst her female work colleagues. Raphael Cordoba stood across the street, leaning conspicuously on the wall behind him, looking gorgeous in another one of those dark three-piece suits, and wearing those familiar mirrored sunglasses as a shield to the expression in his eyes, if not to his other more than obvious physical attributes.
Physical attributes Beth’s female work colleagues were obviously all agog over!
Not surprisingly, considering those dark and dangerous good looks, and that air of the stalking predator that he wore like a second skin.
Beth had deliberately arranged things so that she arrived at work earlier than anyone else this morning, in an effort to avoid being seen getting out of the chauffeur-driven limousine. Only for Raphael to then announce that he intended coming into the building with her, and spending the day standing beside her desk. She had managed to talk him out of that one, with the compromise that he would wait outside and she wouldn’t attempt to leave the building. But the hope that none of her work colleagues would notice the highly noticeable Raphael Cordoba standing outside on the pavement had obviously been a futile one.
‘Isn’t he just the most sexy man you’ve ever set eyes on?’ Emma joined the two of them at the window.
‘If you like tall, dark, and brooding, yes,’ Beth agreed lightly.
‘What woman in her right mind doesn’t appreciate tall, dark and brooding?’ Amy moved to stand at Beth’s other side. ‘He’s been standing out there for at least two hours now. I wonder what he’s waiting for?’
Beth had two choices at this point in the conversation. She could deny all knowledge of Raphael—which, considering he would no doubt approach and talk to her when she left the building later on today, making it obvious the two of them knew each other, probably wasn’t the best move!—or she could admit to knowing him, if not the real reason he stood outside watching the comings and going into the building so intently.
She went with the second option. ‘He’s waiting for me, actually,’ she announced casually, wincing slightly as the other three women immediately all turned to look at her with wide, incredulous, and envious eyes, respectively. ‘Raphael drove me into work this morning, and we’re having lunch together, so he decided to hang around until then rather than drive home and then come back into town again later.’ All true—apart from the bit about the two of them having lunch together!
‘Raphael?’ Emma prompted breathlessly as she turned back to look out of the window.
‘Raphael Cordoba,’ Beth supplied reluctantly, wondering if she hadn’t just made this situation even more difficult. If that was possible, of course. ‘He’s Argentinian.’
‘You only spent a week in Argentina and you still managed to bring that hunk back with you?’ The forthright Kathy stared at her.
‘Well…yes.’ Beth winced. ‘We met through mutual friends, and he decided to—to come back to England with me for a while.’ Again, all true—apart from the one little fact Beth hadn’t mentioned, which was that Raphael was here as her bodyguard and not her boyfriend.
Not that the words ‘boyfriend’ and ‘Raphael Cordoba’ could ever be put together in the same sentence anyway!
Raphael might only be ten years older than Beth in calendar years, but he was years older than that in sophistication and experience. Most especially physical experience…
The latter was something that Beth had definitely been made fully aware of the previous evening!
‘He drove you into work this morning?’ Tall, blonde, beautiful, and extremely nice Amy was the one to latch onto that comment.
Beth’s cheeks instantly coloured self-consciously at what that obviously implied. ‘Yes, he did.’
‘And do the size of his feet— Ouch!’ Emma complained as Kathy dug her in the ribs with her elbow. ‘I was only going to ask!’
‘I believe we all know what you were going to ask.’ Kathy chuckled softly. ‘And I think it’s bad enough that we’ve all been standing here drooling over Beth’s boyfriend, without making the situation worse by asking her highly personal questions.’
‘I agree.’ Amy nodded briskly even as she gave Beth an apologetic glance. ‘Coffee break’s over, ladies, time to go back to work.’
Beth breathed an inward sigh of relief as they all turned and returned to their respective desks.
At the same time as she realised that her explanation for Raphael’s presence outside meant they might not have been going to have lunch together today but that they certainly were now!
* * *
‘I thought you said it was your intention to have lunch at your desk.’ Raphael’s comment was cut short as Beth, having linked her arm with his, now rested her hands against his chest before moving up on tiptoe and lightly brushing the softness of her lips against his.
She moved away abruptly. ‘Would you just walk?’ she instructed between the gritted teeth that were obviously meant to resemble a smile.
Raphael’s feet remained firmly planted on the pavement. ‘Walk where?’
‘This way,’ Beth hissed even as she waved to a tall and beautiful blonde woman on the other side of the street. ‘Just start walking and I’ll tell you when to stop.’ She dragged him along beside her as she stomped off down the street.
‘It is too much to ask for an explanation as to your strange behaviour, I suppose?’ Raphael prompted dryly as he fell into easy step beside her.
Brown eyes flashed Beth’s irritation as she spared him an impatient glance. ‘Do you have to wear those sunglasses all the time? The sun isn’t even shining today!’
Raphael reached up and removed the offending glasses before placing them in the breast pocket of his jacket. ‘Better?’
‘Much!’ Which was a total lie, when Beth found being the sole focus of those piercing blue eyes so totally unnerving. Just as she was desperately trying, after Kathy’s risqué comments earlier, not to glance down and admire Raphael’s size-twelve feet…
‘Enough so that you will now answer my question?’
She sighed heavily as she glanced quickly away from his feet. ‘The people I work with all think that the two of us are having lunch together.’
Raphael raised surprised brows. ‘And why would they think that?’
‘Because I told them that we were.’
‘Why?’
Another one of those questions Beth would rather not answer. After the put-down she had received from Raphael the night before she would rather not spend any more time alone with him at all. Or be so aware now of the muscled tautness of his arm beneath her fingertips!
A Touch of Notoriety Page 7