by Lynne Graham
‘If we’re really going to Rio,’ Tia said breathlessly, ‘I have a school friend there whom I would love to visit. I haven’t seen Madalena since we were eighteen and she left school to go home to her family. We write to each other...well, she writes occasionally. She’s very busy.’
‘Is she one of those troubled girls you mentioned?’ Max enquired almost lazily.
‘Of course not. Madalena was Head Girl in our last year,’ Tia told him cheerfully.
‘You should spend an evening with her,’ Max suggested.
‘Yes. It would be wonderful to have the chance to catch up with what she’s been doing,’ Tia remarked, thinking that she would be listening rather than contributing at any such reunion because Madalena’s family was well-off and her former schoolmate seemed to enjoy a dynamic social life. But even so she would very much enjoy seeing the bubbly brunette again. Madalena was a lot of fun and fun was something that had been in very short supply in Tia’s life since her school days had ended.
At the airport, they boarded a private jet. Tia was astonished when Max pointed out the Grayson logo on the tail fin and explained that her grandfather owned it. When he had said ‘wealthy’ it had not occurred to her that he could mean quite that level of wealth. She sat quietly in her upholstered leather seat while she was served a delicious lunch. Max pretty much worked and she wondered if that was the norm for him or if rather, and which she felt was very likely, she simply bored him. Their lives were very different. They had nothing in common, she conceded unhappily. What could an international businessman of Max Leonelli’s stature possibly find worthy of interest in a girl who had spent her entire restricted life in a convent?
Thoroughly depressed by that thought and scolding herself for the reality, Tia petted Teddy, who had quietened down considerably after his spell in the carrier. Teddy went to sleep and Tia eventually dozed off too.
As the jet landed at Rio, Max reflected with satisfaction on his morning of work. He only belatedly recalled his passengers and the whole point of the trip to Rio de Janeiro. He was supposed to be using the opportunity to get to know Tia. Yet unlike most women he knew she had not uttered a word of complaint at being ignored. His conscience twanged as he studied her, her beautiful face tranquil in sleep, that exquisite pillowy mouth more tempting than ever in repose. Teddy’s little beady eyes snapped open as if he could sense Max’s proximity even when asleep and he bared his teeth in a silent snarl.
‘Get used to me,’ Max murmured drily. ‘I’m not going away.’
He would marry her. It was true that he hadn’t even thought of marriage before Andrew cornered him but Tia was beautiful and kind and undemanding. How could any man possibly do better than that winning combination in a woman? He had had a lot of partners in his bed over the years, had revelled in all the variety that imbued such freedom; however, Tia ticked all the right boxes. And came with a massive inheritance, the other side of his brain reminded him. But that wasn’t a box he had sought to tick because, even before he’d accepted Andrew’s offer to step temporarily into the CEO job to free Andrew up for his unsuccessful treatment, Max had been rich enough in his own right to be satisfied with his lifestyle. At the same time though he relished the daily challenge of controlling Grayson Industries. Power, he acknowledged wryly, was definitely an aphrodisiac.
Tia whooped in delight when she saw the massive Christ the Redeemer statue, Rio’s most striking landmark. Max was quick to realise that he was unlikely to escape that tourist pilgrimage and he breathed in deep. Well, at least someone was likely to appreciate the private chapel at Andrew’s country house which the older man had had meticulously restored in the hope of encouraging his devout son’s, Paul’s, return to England.
When the limousine that had collected them at the airport drew up outside the giant opulent hotel where they were to stay, Tia was momentarily overpowered. ‘This is the hotel? But it’s famous.’
‘Yes.’ A dancing smile slashed Max’s beautifully shaped mouth, his dark as night eyes gleaming. ‘I thought you would enjoy it.’
Tia felt overwhelmed. That smile engulfed her like a tidal wave, washing away clear thought, igniting afresh all the physical reactions that both thrilled and unnerved her at one and the same time. She smoothed her fingers down over her best skirt, made of cotton cloth that had once been a pristine white but which now had a creamy tinge. ‘I’m not dressed for a place like this, Max,’ she pointed out uneasily.
‘But you will be soon,’ Max told her. ‘I’ve organised a new wardrobe for you. Someone is coming to our suite to measure you and someone else will then arrive with a selection of clothing for you to choose from.’
‘Are you joking?’ Tia whispered in astonishment.
‘No. Your grandfather wants you to have whatever you want.’
‘But I didn’t ask for clothes.’ Tia reddened. ‘Well, I know I need them.’
‘Let’s not make a big deal of it, then. Andrew is a generous man,’ Max told her, nodding to the driver to open the passenger door beside her.
Flustered, Tia climbed out, smoothing her skirt again, her palms sweating as she scanned the ornate front entrance and the even more opulent interior she could see through the open doors. Inside she could see elegantly dressed people moving around and her courage almost tanked at that point because she knew how shabby and poor she had to look in comparison. What had passed muster at the convent could not even compare to the smartly uniformed staff surging towards them to pick up their luggage. Teddy was checked in to the equivalent of a luxury kennel and Tia parted with her pet with reluctance.
The dog settled, Max planted a controlling hand to the base of her spine and swept Tia back into the lift, ignoring her resistance. ‘Stop acting so nervous,’ he breathed in her ear. ‘You’re a Grayson and your grandfather has made that name something to be proud of. Clothes aren’t important.’
It was all right for him, Tia reflected on a surge of brief resentment, for Max exuded the sophisticated, exclusive lustre of a male who had only just stepped off a glossy magazine cover. Every inch of him was groomed and sleek. He reeked of money and self-assurance, neither trait being one she had ever enjoyed, but she knew that Mother Sancha would have agreed with his outlook rather than her own and she gritted her teeth. Within minutes they were ensconced in the lift with their luggage.
The magnificent suite reminded Tia of rooms she had seen on a popular Brazilian soap opera based on a very rich family. The views were stupendous, on one side looking out over the huge city and on the other out over a vast beach and the sea. Every window opened out onto a balcony and the furniture was beautifully upholstered in colours that struck her as wildly impractical for daily use. She followed the porter into a glorious bedroom, walked into an attached bathroom resplendent with marble and mirrors and gold taps. Her fingertips brushed a white fleecy towel and then trailed over the shot silk spread on the bed before withdrawing again.
‘Tia,’ Max called. ‘I have something for you.’
Tia moved forward on uncertain legs, already overcome by her luxurious surroundings and the bewildering suspicion that she had accidentally strayed into someone else’s dream. She gazed up at Max, colliding unwarily with his stunning, heavily lashed dark as night eyes. Her breath feathered in her throat and her heart slammed with sudden force against her breastbone as he extended his hand. ‘For you from me,’ he intoned. ‘It’s all charged up and ready to use.’
It was a mobile phone with a sparkly cover, the sort of cover a teenager might have admired but Tia was not fussy. With a whoop of pleasure at finally receiving what she had long wanted, Tia whirled breathlessly round the room. Madalena had kept on sending her phone number as if Tia could somehow magically conjure a phone out of thin air but she had kept her friend’s letters. ‘Thank you, Max,’ she said.
Max was a little disconcerted not to receive another hug, had indeed braced himself for one, but Tia, did he but know it, knew she had to be more circumspect around him once she had under
stood how much he attracted her. She didn’t want to behave like an infatuated schoolgirl and make a fool of herself.
The flowers were the next delivery, a gorgeous display of white lilies and foliage arranged by a maid in a crystal vase. ‘For...me?’ Tia whispered breathlessly, a fingertip stroking a velvety petal in appreciation.
‘Of course for you...’
Tia could not imagine why Max was giving her flowers when they were already in each other’s company and he had nothing to thank her for. The romantic angle, she discarded entirely as an explanation, having decided during the flight that allowing foolish fancies to take over her brain was likely only to lead to her humiliation.
Max got the message that he was not making his interest obvious enough and that was when he regretted not paying more attention to her while they were airborne. He studied her glowing face as she caressed the lily and imagined that small work-roughened hand gliding over a far more responsive part of his body and anticipation leapt through him like a sudden flame ready to burst out of control. The stirring of enthusiasm at his groin was unmistakeable and made him ache. He didn’t know why she had that instantaneous effect on him. Indeed, his lack of control around Tia annoyed him because he hadn’t suffered from the affliction of involuntary arousal since he was at school.
‘You like the flowers?’
‘Yes,’ she whispered distractedly. ‘I love flowers. I always dreamt of having a real garden of my own.’
‘I thought you wanted to be a teacher,’ Max remarked, because the Reverend Mother had shared that with him.
‘I was willing to be one to get the training and the education. In my life it’s always been a question of not what you want but what is possible,’ Tia explained. ‘There’s a teacher training college in Belém and I thought that studying there would be achievable but my father wasn’t willing to pay for it and that was that.’
‘Andrew’s country house has beautiful gardens,’ Max told her, watching the tip of her tongue steal out to moisten her full lower lip as she looked up at him and almost groaning with the force of his arousal.
His dark eyes were gleaming like gold ingots and Tia couldn’t drag her gaze from his lean, darkly beautiful face. Without even knowing what she was doing she took an infinitesimal step closer and Max reached for her almost simultaneously, hands sliding round her back and yanking her into contact with his lean, powerful body with a sexual insistence and impatience that should have shocked her but which instead thrilled her.
It was Tia’s first kiss—first everything, really—and the hard, hungry pressure of his beautiful masculine mouth crashing down on hers unleashed so many sensations in her body that she felt dizzy. The tips of her breasts tingled and stiffened, pushing against the coarse cotton material of her top. A sliding warmth prickled between her thighs and made her press them together tightly. Suddenly she was insanely conscious of a part of her body she never thought about, of the sensitivity and the shocking level of physical awareness she had never known before.
His tongue licked along the fullness of her lower lip and then nibbled at the tender swollen flesh before his tongue plunged into her mouth and withdrew. At that point her legs would have folded under her had he not literally been holding her upright with his hands because the sexual vibrations assailing her only intensified. A choked gasp was dragged from her as he spread his fingers across her narrow shoulder and held her there to kiss her breathless.
Max was fiercely fighting an insane urge to carry her into his bedroom when the knocking at the door finally penetrated the fog of his passion. What the hell was he doing? he asked himself furiously as he jerked back from her, almost overwhelmed by the passionate response he had won from her. He wanted more, he wanted so much more that it took a lot longer than the few seconds he had to get a grip on himself before he opened the door.
Four women greeted him with wide smiles and swiftly identified themselves as the team engaged to provide Tia with a new wardrobe. Shooting her a cloaked glance to note that she was very flushed and dazed in appearance, he urged her to take them into her bedroom.
Diavolo, he castigated himself as soon as the bedroom door closed. He had jumped the gun, offered too much too soon and probably shocked her, but going slowly with a woman, much like talking in a normal way, was something Max had never done before. And he had utilised all the finesse of a bull in a china shop, an awareness that infuriated him as he stomped off to change and have a cold shower to chill the fever still burning through him. It was not as though he were sex-starved, he reasoned angrily with himself, so why that lack of control? That mad grab and hold making-out session, which was not his style at all?
Relieved to escape the immediate aftermath of that embrace with Max, Tia was happy to be distracted by measurements and catalogues depicting various styles. She had only wanted jeans and tee shirts and some decent shoes but there was, she discovered in amazement, a vast area of choice from which to make selections. The little girl and disappointed teenager who had never got to have pretty clothes triumphed in the adult she had become and she went a little crazy before panicking and surging back into the other room to find Max.
‘What’s my budget...? I mean, how much can I spend?’ she pressed anxiously.
‘There is no budget. Order anything that takes your fancy...handbags, shoes, everything,’ Max stressed. ‘You’ll need it all in England and it’s better to arrive prepared.’
Tia surveyed his darkly handsome features with wondering appreciation. Had ever a young woman been so blessed as she was at that moment? she marvelled, smiling widely at him. She could buy anything she liked and Max, the man of her dreams, had kissed her, which meant that he was attracted to her as well, even if she suspected that he hadn’t quite intended to kiss her when he had.
Was Max struggling with the same feelings she was struggling with? Feeling buoyant at that suspicion and walking on air in the belief that the growing strength of her feelings was being reciprocated, Tia vanished back into the bedroom.
CHAPTER THREE
‘I DON’T WANT TO,’ Tia said simply as Afonso, one of Madalena’s male friends, tried to pull her into the bedroom that had just been vacated by another couple.
‘Thought you wanted to lose that V-card...’ In the face of her refusal, Afonso managed to both smile and sneer simultaneously. He was good-looking and he knew it, his lack of familiarity with rejection obvious to her.
‘Maddie was joking, for goodness’ sake,’ Tia declared, wishing that that were true of her former best friend but no longer quite sure because she felt as if she was learning the hard way that four years could change a friend into someone she barely recognised.
‘No, she wasn’t,’ Afonso insisted, still unwilling to accept that no meant no in Tia’s case as he pulled her against him with a possessive and determined hand.
He was drenched in cologne and she could hardly breathe that close to him. She gave him a dispassionate glance, hating the swimming sensation in her head from the alcohol she had already told Madalena she didn’t want to drink. Not because she was stuffy and prim, as Maddie had insisted she was. She had refused more alcohol as soon as she’d felt her body overreacting to that second large drink. No, indeed: the very last thing Tia wanted to risk was getting drunk at a wild party full of strangers, none of whom she felt she could rely on.
It was ironic that she wasn’t having anything like the fun she had once assumed such social events delivered when she was younger. Fun, she rather thought now, depended on the company you were in and she knew she was in the wrong company. Losing her virginity with some stranger on a night out had no appeal for her. Maddie, however, had decided it was a terrific idea, pointing out that the first time was always ‘rubbish’ for a woman. Tia had said nothing because that conversation had taken place in a group setting and she had been embarrassed at having her sexual ignorance talked about in public as if it were solely a subject for amusement.
Nothing with Maddie had gone as Tia had planned a
nd hoped. When she had phoned Maddie that afternoon, the brunette had invited her over that very evening and Tia had naively pictured a chatty session of catching up. When she’d arrived, though, Maddie had already been entertaining a bunch of friends and the first thing she had done was insist that Tia borrow some of her party clothes to go out with them. Stripped of her jeans and tee, Tia had found herself being crammed into tight satin shorts and a backless top, both garments exposing far more of her body than she was comfortable with. But the other women had been wearing similar outfits and she had wanted so desperately to try to fit in and not be the party pooper Maddie had suggested she was that she had kept her reservations to herself.
Maddie was engaged to a handsome young businessman. Unhappily the couple had vanished within minutes of arriving at the party, lumbering Tia with Afonso and his sidekicks, whose only topic of conversation appeared to be dirty, rather infantile jokes. Before Maddie had finally abandoned her, however, Tia had seen a scattering of powder below her school friend’s nose and had suspected that she was using drugs, which probably explained her unfamiliar highly extroverted and bad-tempered behaviour.
‘So where exactly are we here?’ Tia asked again.
‘Why do you keep on asking me that? I don’t know the address. It belongs to Domingos Paredes. We’re in Jardim Botânico. It’s an exclusive residential area.’ Afonso trailed a suggestive hand down her bare back, making her shudder. ‘Play your cards right and you could end up swanning around a house like this. I bet there’s nothing you want more than to be a wife and a mother. Some guys go for that. Come on...stop being such a prude.’