Bile burned the back of his throat. Obviously he would have to disabuse her of such a notion—if she held it—at the earliest possible opportunity.
He spun back to the desk and forced himself to read through the rest of the article. And as he did so the coldness inside him grew.
It appears that Ms Stephens has a weakness for playboys. Formerly linked with renowned artist and party-boy Duncan Payne, who rocketed to overnight fame and fortune when he won Australia’s premier visual arts award, she has now set her sights on a bigger prize.
A small photograph revealed Wynne on a red carpet, smiling up into the face of a tall blond man. Xavier gripped the pages of the paper so tightly they tore.
She’d lied. She’d told him she was attracted to no-hope losers, but...
He stared at the photograph and swore savagely. She’d been stringing him along. All this time she’d been pretending to be honest and straightforward and caring and kind, but it was all a lie.
He recalled her lack of concern yesterday, when he’d said he couldn’t spend the night with her.
Darkness threatened the edges of his vision. The whole time she’d been playing him. Just like Camilla had. And, just like Camilla, she probably didn’t even like him! He’d thought she was different. He’d thought...
He frowned. No, it didn’t make sense. If she didn’t like him, what on earth would she get from a brief fling with him? Camilla had taken him for millions, but Wynne...
He stilled.
She’d not only got to remain working at the motel she loved, but was about to have it refurbished and modernised.
She’d safeguarded the jobs of the staff she felt responsible for.
She’d got to protect her grandmother.
His stomach twisted. He couldn’t accuse Wynne of the same calculated cruelty as Camilla, but she’d had an agenda all the same. And she’d played him to achieve each and every one of her goals.
And he was a fool. Again.
His hands clenched. Well, no more. He could at least preserve a measure of dignity. Wynne could keep her position here, her staff could keep their jobs, and Aggie certainly need have no fear of him... But the one thing it was in his power to do was to call things off between them.
And the sooner he did that the better.
* * *
Wynne stared at the two-page spread Tina had all but dragged her to the front desk to see.
‘Oh, for heaven’s sake!’ she muttered under her breath. ‘Don’t these people have better things to do than take pictures of Xavier and partner him up with every girl he has a meal with?’
‘You’re not dining out in this one.’
Tina pointed to a photograph of Wynne and Xavier walking on a moonlit beach...hand in hand.
Tina tapped the page. ‘And look at how he’s looking at you in this picture.’
‘Don’t go getting all starry-eyed on me.’
She made her voice tart, to counter the ache in her throat. This stupid newspaper article would give Xavier the excuse he needed to call off their brief...relationship—not that it deserved the word.
It had taken all her strength to feign nonchalance at Xavier’s slowing of their affair yesterday. Everything inside her had rebelled at the idea. But she had her pride, and she had managed it.
She still had her pride.
She tossed her head. ‘What’s between me and Xavier is—’
‘Yes?’
The deep, masculine voice with its stern, grim tone made both her and Tina start.
She’d been about to say temporary, but when she glanced up into Xavier’s unsmiling face she silently amended it to over. She didn’t need to be a rocket scientist to see ‘end of the affair’ written all over his face.
She forced herself to smile. ‘Personal,’ she said, very gently.
There was an unleashed violence in the set of his shoulders that she didn’t want to let loose.
‘Have you seen this?’ She held up the paper.
His lip curled. ‘Yes.’
Perfect.
She bit back a sigh. Turning briefly to Tina, she said, ‘Can you chase up Bradford and Sons? If they won’t give me a quote and a start date by close of business today, then tell them we’ll be hiring someone else.’
Tina nodded. ‘Roger.’
Wynne ushered Xavier towards the mercifully empty drawing room. ‘I’m sorry, but Tina only just alerted me to the article so I haven’t read it all the way through yet. Do you mind...?’
‘Be my guest.’
But his every word came out clipped, and it was all she could do not to wince.
Or cry.
He was going to call it off. He was going to walk out of her life just when she was the happiest she’d ever been, and she didn’t know how she would bear it.
You knew this would happen.
It was just... His lovemaking had been so tender and intense, and she’d started to think...
More fool you.
She pressed a hand to her forehead. An ending had always been inevitable, no matter how much she might wish otherwise. She’d been playing with fire and hoping she wouldn’t get burned, but who had she been kidding? Her temples throbbed. It was never going to be possible for her to take a lover with casual unconcern and then simply move on untouched when the affair came to an end. She just wasn’t built that way. And wishing otherwise had simply been a shield to hide behind, to hide from the truth—that she’d fallen in love with Xavier.
But she’d rather die than reveal that to him. He’d told her he didn’t do long-term. He’d told her he didn’t do love.
He’d told her!
The fact that she’d thought he’d been starting to care—
She shook her head.
Read the article.
She spread the newspaper out on the dining table, but she didn’t sit because Xavier didn’t sit. And she read. She huffed out a silent and somewhat bitter laugh. Trust them to mention Duncan. Typical.
‘Okay.’ She straightened when she reached the end. ‘It’s not too bad. It’s all superficial nonsense, of course, but no outrageous claims have been made.’
His eyes flashed. ‘No outrageous claims?’
She gestured to the paper. ‘It’s all speculation on the journalist’s part—along with an attempt at...at titillation. There’s nothing here, at least not that I can see, that will be harmful to either one of us or harmful to business.’
The cynicism that stretched across his face had her chafing her arms in an attempt to rub the sudden chill away.
‘I expect you’ll view such publicity as beneficial to business?’
She stared at him. ‘You can’t think I had anything to do with this?’
He shrugged, and the utter indifference of the gesture was like a knife to the heart. It was all she could do to stay upright.
‘Who knows what goes on in the heart and mind of a woman?’
She fell back a step. ‘I have no idea what you’re blathering on about, but—’
‘Blathering!’ His brows snapped together and his hands clenched.
She recalled those hands moving over her body, sparking sensation and generating a passion she hadn’t known existed, and had to swallow. ‘I can assure you—’ she kept her head high ‘—that I had nothing to do with that newspaper article.’
‘Why should I believe you?’
The deceptively soft question punched the breath from her body. It took several deep gulps of air before she was able to answer. ‘After everything we’ve shared you’re going to question my honesty now?’ A vice-like pain gripped her temples. ‘You won’t simply take my word for it?’
She’d thought him walking out of her life and never seeing him again would be the hardest thing she would have to
bear. She’d been wrong.
‘You warned me you were a good liar.’ He raised one of those fatally sceptical eyebrows as his finger came down on the photograph of her and Duncan. ‘It seems you twist the truth to suit your own purposes. This Duncan does not seem to be one of those...what did you call them? No-hope losers?’
He had to be joking!
‘Duncan was the biggest no-hope loser of them all.’ Her laugh held an edge she couldn’t contain. ‘He had nothing when I met him. Nothing. The agent who picked him up and launched his career used to be a regular here at Aggie’s Retreat. I introduced them. Duncan dated me with the sole view of meeting that agent.’
Xavier’s head rocked back, but his shock gave her no satisfaction. This was what he thought of her?
‘When Duncan shot to fame and fortune he took his agent with him—but not me. His agent, I might add, wouldn’t be seen dead staying anywhere as downmarket as Aggie’s Retreat these days.’
‘Why did he not take you with him?’
‘Because I wasn’t sophisticated enough, polished enough, or glamorous enough for his new world.’ She folded her arms, acid burning a reckless path through her veins. ‘You and Duncan have a lot in common, Xavier.’
She whirled away and made for the door, but then changed her mind and spun back. ‘I knew yesterday that you were looking for a way to end things between us, but is this how you choose to do it—like this? By grabbing on to some stupid newspaper story and giving credence to its lies?’
She halted in front of him and slammed her hands to her hips. ‘I knew things between us were only temporary, but I thought we could at least part as friends. I deserve more respect from you than that!’
She had to halt to pull a breath into her lungs. He opened his mouth, but she shook her head.
‘I don’t want to hear another word you have to say. I liked you, Xavier. I really liked you.’ Beneath his tan, he paled. ‘But you’re barely human.’ She tossed her head. ‘I won’t say any more now, for fear of being fired.’
This time when she made for the door she had no intention of stopping.
‘I told you I would not dismiss you!’
The words were roared after her, but she didn’t break stride.
* * *
Wynne sought the refuge of her cottage. She couldn’t hide herself there all day, but she could nurse her anger and her hurt over a cup of tea before donning her armour and getting on with things.
But when she entered her yard she found Luis playing a disconsolate and solitary game of tether tennis.
She glanced at her watch—nine-thirty a.m. Why wasn’t he with his nanny?
‘Hello, Luis.’
When he spun round she saw he’d been crying. She held out her arms and he ran into them. She carried him over to the garden bench and let him cry.
She dried his face and cuddled him close. ‘Do you want to tell me what’s wrong?’
He snuggled into her. ‘No.’
His voice was small and dispirited, and it caught at her heart. ‘Would you like me to fetch Paula?’
‘No!’
The tension that radiated through his small body made her frown, though she told herself to smile down at him. ‘I’m your friend, Luis. I would never do anything to hurt you—you know that, don’t you?’
He nodded.
‘And because I’m your friend that means you can tell me anything. So can you tell me why you’re sad?’
He glanced up at her and bit his lip. ‘Paula tells me that I’m not to ask Papà to play with me—that he’s very busy.’
She pulled in a breath. ‘It’s true that he’s often busy, but your papà will never be too busy for you. He loves you. He loves you best of all in the world.’
Her young charge straightened. ‘Really?’
She crossed her heart.
‘Paula makes me promise not to tell Papà things.’
A chill chased itself up her spine. ‘She shouldn’t ask you to do that. You can tell your papà anything.’
‘She tells me I’m not tell him that Mamà calls. She and Mamà say that if he knew he would put me in a home for bad boys.’
What? Wynne tried to swallow the anger that fired into her every cell. ‘They’re mistaken, Luis. Very, very mistaken. And do you know what? I can fix this.’
His face lit up.
‘How do you feel about colouring in with Tía Tina for a little while?’
* * *
Wynne knocked on the conference room door. It was rarely closed, which probably meant Xavier wanted privacy.
Bad luck!
‘Enter!’
The word was bellowed, and it was all she could do not to roll her eyes. She pushed into the room to find Xavier ensconced there with an agitated Paula.
‘Luis has slipped away,’ the nanny explained to Wynne.
‘He’s downstairs with Tina.’
‘Oh!’ She leapt up and started for the door. ‘I will go to him at once.’
Wynne shut the door before the other woman could reach it. ‘Take a seat, Paula.’
She glanced across at Xavier and ignored the burning in her chest. She told him all that Luis had just told her. When she’d finished she simply turned and left, closing the door behind her.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
PAULA’S SILENCE AFTER Wynne had left spoke volumes—ugly volumes.
Surely there were extenuating circumstances she could offer up? An explanation that a little boy wouldn’t understand, but that an adult might?
None were forthcoming.
He paced the length of the room, his limbs cramping with the effort it took not to reach across and shake the woman. ‘You have nothing to say?’
She glared at him. ‘Camilla and I became friends. We bonded when Luis was just a baby...when you made her feel like a failure as a parent.’
He rocked back on his heels.
‘So my loyalties lie with her, not with you.
A fist tightened about his chest. ‘Shouldn’t your loyalties be with Luis?’
‘Camilla thought if Luis was afraid of you sending him away he would want to live with her.’
The back of his throat burned. ‘You pair of—’ He broke off, his hands clenching to fists.
She swallowed, and he realised she was afraid of him. It didn’t displease him, but it gave him no satisfaction either. It was as if he could feel Wynne’s voice inside his head, urging him to calmness—to focus on what was important rather than focussing on his anger and sense of betrayal.
He pulled in a breath. What was important at the moment was making Luis feel safe and secure again.
‘You will pack your things and be ready to return to Spain immediately. I no longer require your services. I will have a driver here in fifteen minutes, and your tickets will be waiting for you at the airport. You will not go anywhere near Luis prior to leaving.’
She stared at him as if she couldn’t believe that was all he meant to say to her.
‘Go!’ he barked, before he changed his mind.
She’d frightened his child, and a dark, primal part of him wanted to tear her limb from limb.
She leapt to her feet and fled.
Xavier organised the flight, and a driver, and then went in search of Luis.
He took him to the beach, and over the building of a sandcastle he told his son how much he loved him. He told him he would never put him in a home—that he wanted Luis to live with him always. He promised that solemnly.
He was careful not to say anything against Camilla.
At the back of his mind a question pounded—had he unknowingly made Camilla feel like a failure as a mother? He’d been so determined that Luis should not be reared with the same cold distance that he had that... Had he
placed too much pressure on her? Had she withdrawn behind that icy hauteur as a form of defence? If so, why hadn’t she said anything? Was he really such an ogre?
He dragged a hand down his face. Why had he not noticed? Why had he not questioned her more, rather than assume that she was as cold and uninterested in her child—and in him—as his mother and grandmother had been?
How much had his assumptions and his retreat behind a forbidding shield been responsible for today’s revelation?
‘Are you sad, Papà?’
He made himself smile for his son. ‘I’m sad at the thought of you not living with me. I don’t want that to ever happen.’
Luis flung his arms around Xavier’s neck. ‘I love you, Papà!’
‘I love you, Luis.’
As his arms closed around the little body he swore that he would become the best person he could for his son.
Which meant at some point trying to make things right with Camilla too...
* * *
Xavier found Wynne checking the housekeeping stock with April a good two hours later. He asked her to step into the conference room for a moment.
Her lips curved upwards pleasantly enough, but her eyes told him to go to blazes.
Acid burned his stomach. She thought him an insensitive jerk.
He did his best not to notice her pallor, or the exhaustion that lined the fine skin about her eyes. ‘I want to thank you for bringing Paula’s duplicity to my attention.’
She picked imaginary lint from her skirt. ‘You’re welcome.’
‘I had no idea that Camilla had recruited Paula in her plan to take revenge against me.’
She didn’t glance up from her skirt. ‘Revenge seems to figure large in your life.’
While her tone was pleasant, the words themselves were an accusation and they cut him to the quick.
He pulled himself up to his full height. He owed this woman. ‘I can see you want to say something.’
‘No, no...’ she assured him.
‘I’d rather you just...’ He searched the air with his fingers. ‘Spat it out.’
‘Actually, I don’t think you would.’
He thrust out his jaw. ‘I insist.’
‘Fine!’ She tossed her glorious head of hair back behind her shoulders. ‘Given what you accused me of earlier, I realise you must find it astounding that I should show so much moral fibre as to step in to help a little boy... Oh, to display such a lack of self-interest! But to tell you the truth, Xavier, I find that insulting.’
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