More Than A Millionaire (Contemporary Romance)

by Sophie Weston

  He said gently, ‘What happened to this monster?’

  ‘I’m not sure.’

  He was surprised. He had her down as loyal, even to elderly and temperamental machines.

  She said with constraint, ‘I haven’t seen it since I came to London. I suppose it may have gone for scrap by now.’

  There was something badly wrong, thought Emilio. For a moment there she sounded almost on the edge of tears.

  He ran through the information he had gathered so far. She had not been home to that place in the country with the old roses she did not know he knew about. She was not going to have a roof over her head tonight. She did not know what had happened to a car that sounded as if it was halfway to being a family pet. Yes, definitely something wrong. For all her turquoise hair and club land image, she sounded as devastated as his little crane fly had nine years ago.

  Would she confide in him, though?

  Yes, Emilio promised himself. Yes, he would get her to trust him if it took the whole evening. Work could wait. This was a girl in bad trouble.

  He said, ‘What would you like to eat? Indian? Thai? Italian?’

  ‘Whatever you want.’

  He was going through the back streets again. Abby was not as lost here as she had been in Mayfair. She had friends in Chelsea. It was full of tall white houses where she had been going to dinner before dances since she was fourteen. Emilio Diz, she realised, was as familiar with the area as she was.

  ‘Have you lived round here long?’

  He laughed. ‘Two days.’

  ‘I don’t believe it.’

  ‘I’ve known London forever. When I was younger I used to travel all the time. Never bought a house here before, though.’ He was rueful suddenly. ‘Not my best decision, so far.’

  Abigail was intrigued. ‘Why is that?’

  ‘We’re supposed to be talking about your problems, not mine,’ he said, caressing again.

  A rebuff, thought Abby. She was almost relieved. It tended to counteract the effect of that velvet voice.

  They were in front of a red-brown Gothic building that she vaguely recognised. He turned into the underground car park. A uniformed man touched his cap as they swept in.

  Abby saw a notice on the wall and made a discovery. ‘This is the old hospital, isn’t it? I read that they were turning it into luxury flats. What are they like?’

  ‘Come up and see for yourself,’ he said easily.

  She hesitated for a microsecond. He picked it up, though. He was quick, she thought, unwillingly impressed.

  ‘No strings,’ he said dryly.

  She stuck her nose in the air. ‘I never thought there were.’

  He parked the car and turned off the engine. The dark eyes glinted as he sent her a measuring look.

  ‘Yes, you did. Very sensible of you, too. I’m sure your mother always told you not to go home with strange men.’

  But for all the teasing tone, she knew he didn’t like it. She didn’t really blame him but she didn’t know what to say. He frowned in preoccupation as he swung his briefcase out of the car. She followed him in the same silence.

  She waited until they were in the lift. Then said carefully, ‘My mother never told me anything. She died when I was twelve but she had been ill for years before that. My father did all the ‘do not trust him gentle maiden’ stuff. Not very well, poor darling.’

  He was startled out of his reverie. ‘What?’

  Abby gave him an apologetic grin. ‘Sorry if I was stupid back there. It’s just that I’m not really a city girl and I don’t always pick up the signals right.’

  He looked at her hard for a moment. How could his eyes be so expressionless and yet feel like a laser beam? Abby looked back at him as openly as she could manage. It was not comfortable.

  In the end he said indifferently, ‘We all protect ourselves as best we can. I have no right to complain.’

  He almost sounded as if he didn’t care, too. Almost. But the Latin accent was back, Abby noticed. She was about to point it out when the lift stopped and he ushered her into his flat. She stopped dead.

  It was empty. She had thought he was not a man to give clues about himself. But this was a totally blank canvas. Just acres of lemony-cream carpet and a fax machine on the floor in one corner.

  ‘Good heavens,’ she said blankly.

  The drawing room was huge, with a tall window embrasure. The cushions on the window-seat were the only furnishings in the room.

  Emilio flung his briefcase behind the door. ‘I thought so,’ he said grimly. He extracted his mobile phone and keyed in a number. ‘Diz.’

  Abby wandered to the window. Her boots left precise footprints in the deep carpet. It must be so new it had never been walked on before.

  Behind her Emilio was talking to someone to whom he did not even bother to say hello. He rapped into the telephone, ‘So what happened this time?’ He listened for a few moments, visibly curbing his impatience. ‘Let me get this clear. Your suppliers aren’t able to deliver the furniture for ten days?’

  If he talked to me in that tone of voice, I wouldn’t answer back, I’d jump to attention, Abby thought.

  The person on the other end seemed to have a less developed sense of self-preservation. The answer was extended.

  Emilio’s frown got blacker and blacker. Eventually the dark brows locked hard into a great fuzz of fury.

  Oh, wow! thought Abby, backing away from the area of conflict.

  ‘Fine,’ he interrupted curtly. ‘Cancel the order. I’ll make other arrangements.’ He snapped off the call before the person at the other end could reply.

  Abby looked at him with trepidation. She did not really want to have dinner with a man seething with fury.

  She need not have worried. With the end of the call, his temper seemed to disappear.

  ‘Right,’ he said pleasantly. ‘Where would you like to eat?’

  It was almost sinister, thought Abby, that total wiping away of all irritation. It was as if he was in absolute control of everything, even his feelings. All her misgivings started humming again.

  If she had had someone to go to, she would have left then. But she hadn’t.

  ‘Wherever you like,’ she muttered.

  In the end he took her to a lively Italian bistro she had known all her life. Known well enough, at any rate, to be impressed by the effortless command which got them one of the two quiet tables in an alcove.

  ‘Smooth,’ said Abby, half amused, half uncertain. She only let the amusement show, though. ‘These tables are like gold dust.’

  He shrugged. ‘The food is good but I don’t like my conversation interrupted by amplified rock.’

  For some reason she felt an urge to needle him. All that control was unnerving. The temptation to stir him up a bit was irresistible.

  She raised her eyebrows. ‘That’s odd. You don’t look the stuffy type.’

  He was taken aback. More, the dark eyes were no longer expressionless. For a moment he was totally outraged.

  ‘Stuffy?’ The single word sounded very foreign all of a sudden.

  Abby bit back a smile and rearranged her cutlery.

  ‘I mean, you’re not exactly old,’ she said innocently.

  He sat bolt upright. The waiter brought wine. He hardly even looked at the bottle, waving the man to pour.

  ‘I am thirty-four,’ he bit out.

  ‘It must be all those millions,’ said Abby with spurious sympathy.

  He was deeply suspicious. ‘What must?’

  Abby was beginning to enjoy herself. She looked up and widened her eyes at him. ‘Well, you’re very serious, aren’t you?’

  But she had overplayed her hand. She saw him realise that she was winding him up. He relaxed and picked up his wine.

  ‘Are you telling me to get a life, Lady Abigail?’ he asked softly. And that caressing note was back with a vengeance.

  Abby shivered like an animal, fascinated in spite of herself.

  ‘I wouldn’t
dare,’ she said, only half joking.

  He lounged back in his chair and surveyed her. ‘I’ve partied with experts, believe me.’

  Abby looked at the strong handsome face—and the lithe body under his city suit. She remembered that body, glistening in the sun. She remembered him leaping like a dolphin to put all that glorious physical power behind his winning shot. She remembered the effect it had had on even sensible Señora Montijo.

  Oh, yes, he would have partied with experts. Of course he had. A body like that wouldn’t be allowed to do anything else. It stood to reason.

  What was less reasonable was that it should make her own heart beat faster at the thought. Why did she suddenly feel as if she was the prey he was stalking through some dark forest? She wasn’t afraid of party animals. She knew too many, including at least three of her brothers.

  And then she thought—that’s the first clue to who he is. Empty car, empty flat and not a single bit of personal information at the meeting and a novice’s guide to business principles in the car. But he’s just told me something about the man he really is. Something personal. Her heart beat harder still.

  She said hastily, ‘Nothing to do with me, anyway. I shouldn’t have said that.’

  ‘Why not? Because I’m an important client?’ There was an edge to the warm voice.

  Abby was honestly shocked. ‘No! Because you rescued me from the rain and brought me to dinner.’

  He looked at her oddly. ‘I see,’ he said after a moment. ‘Well, I haven’t rescued you from very much yet. You were going to tell me the problem.’

  Abby wished he hadn’t reminded her. She bit her lip.

  ‘So you can apply your famous entrepreneurial skills to my homeless state?’ she asked. But her smile wavered.

  ‘Sure, if necessary. So tell me—who have you been living with up to now?’

  She tried not to wince. Her eyes fell. ‘I’ve had the basement in a family house.’

  He digested this. ‘And now the boyfriend’s mother wants you out?’

  ‘No.’ Her eyes flew to his face in astonishment. ‘Where did you get that idea?’

  He shrugged. ‘It seemed the likeliest. So who is throwing you out?’

  Abby swallowed. ‘My father’s wife,’ she said in a brittle voice. ‘My father’s new wife.’

  There was a little silence.

  She seized her glass of wine and drank a great gulp as if it was water. She did not look at him but she could feel those steady dark eyes, unwavering. She had no idea what he was thinking.

  Eventually he said, ‘I think you’d better tell me everything.’

  And to her astonishment, she did.

  Everything. Not just her father coming back from his holiday married to Justine, but the years before when Abby left college early to run the Yorkshire house after the housekeeper left at a moment’s notice. The struggle to maintain the jewel of a house on a shoestring. The beauty of the countryside; the loneliness when her father was travelling, now that all her brothers moved on; her shyness.

  When she had finished he said, ‘Poor Cinderella.’

  Abby was startled. ‘I’m not a Cinderella. I’m an independent woman with a career of her own. I just started a bit late, that’s all.’

  ‘And now you don’t have a roof over your head.’

  She sighed. ‘I’ll have to go to a hotel, I suppose. Maybe if I go to one of the cheapo tourist places they won’t recognise the name.’

  He pulled a face. ‘A student dive? The blankets will be thin and too short and you’ll spend the night listening to the television next door.’

  Abby was amused in spite of herself. ‘What do you know about student dives?’

  ‘I haven’t always been in the important-client class,’ Emilio said dryly. ‘You’d be amazed at some of the dumps I’ve stayed in.’

  Another clue to the mystery that was Emilio Diz?

  ‘It sounds like it,’ said Abby, distracted.

  ‘You deserve better than that.’

  She was surprisingly touched. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘You could always go somewhere decent and I could pay the bill,’ he suggested.

  Abby shuddered at the thought. ‘The point is to avoid scandal,’ she said firmly. ‘Anyway, I can’t borrow money from strangers.’

  ‘You wouldn’t be borrowing money. I’d just be making a payment on your behalf,’ he said fluently.

  ‘And you think that wouldn’t get into the papers?’ mocked Abby. ‘Your name would be even more of a news item than mine.’

  He sighed. ‘You’re right, of course.’

  ‘So back to Plan A.’

  He frowned down at his plate. He had only been playing with his penne alla Norma ever since the waiter put the dish in front of him. Now he put his fork down.

  ‘Not necessarily.’ He leaned forward. ‘Look, I’ve got a problem, too. Maybe we could help each other.’

  ‘Oh? What sort of problem?’

  Abby wasn’t exactly suspicious but she wasn’t going to commit herself to wholehearted support of any scheme thought up by Emilio Diz until he was a little more specific. She didn’t trust him. Nobody made millions by the time they were thirty-four without being tricky, not if they’d started out in student dives.

  He saw her reservations and laughed softly. ‘I need a woman.’

  Abby dropped her fork. She felt the colour flood into her cheeks like the stain would seep across this paper tablecloth if she tipped her excellent glass of wine onto it. Her eyes flew to his.

  ‘Isn’t that what you expected me to say?’ he asked, smooth as honey.

  ‘No, of course not,’ she said with heat. ‘It’s not the sort of thing people do say. Not just come out with it like that across a dinner table.’ She flapped her hands helplessly. ‘Not in my experience.’

  He smiled but the dark eyes were not amused. He would be an implacable enemy, Abby thought suddenly.

  But all he said was, ‘Then I’ve widened your experience. I told you I would.’

  ‘Anyway, I don’t believe it’s true.’ Too late, she recognised mockery. At once fury replaced her embarrassment. And, as always when she lost her temper, she lost her sense of self-preservation to go with it.

  ‘Men as rich as you must have women falling over themselves to do whatever you want,’ she said waspishly. ‘Even if you have forgotten about cool cars.’

  His eyes flared.

  Got you, thought Abby with satisfaction. You weren’t expecting that.

  He smiled. Abby wondered whether tigers smiled when they sighted their prey through the undergrowth. She knew just how they would look.

  ‘You think my wealth would make a woman overlook the fact that I’m a bore?’ His tone was affable—and very, very Latin.

  Maybe getting him on the raw hadn’t been such a good idea after all. Now she came to think of it, he probably hadn’t got that rich at thirty-four by letting people score points off him, either.

  ‘Er—’

  ‘And of course you are right.’ Very Latin, very sober. He met her eyes candidly.

  She didn’t trust him an inch.

  ‘O-oh?’

  ‘To be very frank, women are a problem for me.’

  Not an inch, not a centimetre, not a millimetre, thought Abby indignantly.

  ‘Really?’ she said with a snap.

  ‘Of course I’m not alone in that.’

  ‘Have you tried a lonely hearts column?’

  He ignored that. ‘There is a whole generation of us. The Cyber Millionaires, they call us. We do what we love—it makes us a fortune and then—wham!’

  He clapped his hands together. To Abby’s acute embarrassment, heads turned sharply. Emilio was magnificently unaware. He leaned forward.

  ‘We can’t afford to marry,’ he told her, his eyes tragic. ‘Our lives are ruined.’

  ‘Oh, sure,’ said Abby with irony. ‘Why can’t you afford to marry? Don’t like narrowing your options down to one woman?’

  The tragic
look disappeared to be replaced by speculation. ‘You don’t believe me.’

  ‘I believe you’ll do whatever you want, whenever you want, whether you can afford to or not,’ she said with asperity.

  His eyes flickered. There was a sharp little silence.

  Abby thought, startled, I’ve got him again. And I wasn’t even trying…

  He said eventually, ‘You ought to meet my lawyer. That’s exactly what he’s afraid of. I get notes from him all the time.’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘We are talking about community property and the fact that prenuptual agreements aren’t reliable,’ he explained.

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘If the marriage falls apart, the lady could walk with half my stake in the company. Independent shareholders won’t stand for it. So if I want to float the company, I have to stay celibate.’

  It was too much, when he had been sitting there, purring and predatory as a tiger all through the meal.

  ‘Celibate?’ said Abby in disbelieving reflex.

  He gave a slow smile.

  Instantly she felt as if she had been boiled in oil.

  Why did I say that? Why don’t I think before I open my mouth?

  Another hideous flush threatened. Abby fought it, struggling to find a neutral expression. She knew that he was watching in deep appreciation. She seethed—and dropped her fork into her pasta.

  His smile grew. ‘Well, single,’ he allowed. His voice was slow, deep and dripping with sexual innuendo.

  Abby swigged her wine as if it was water again. This time she choked.

  ‘I can see you’re just breaking your heart over it,’ she said, when she could speak.

  He laughed aloud at that. ‘I’m not looking for a wife at the moment,’ he admitted. ‘But I do need some female help quite badly.’

  ‘Oh, yes?’ Abby said noncommittally.

  ‘You’ve seen the apartment.’ He spread his hands. ‘I need someone to furnish it.’

  She stared. ‘So employ an interior decorator.’

  ‘I did. That was him on the phone this evening. I fired him.’

  ‘I heard. Maybe you ought to call him back and unfire him.’

  ‘He won’t do what I want. He’s turning it into his great work of art. He wants me to wait ten weeks to get a decent bed. God knows how long it will take to have somewhere to sit down.’ He looked at her pleadingly. ‘What I need is a sensible woman who knows the London shops and will get me some furniture fast.’