More Than A Millionaire (Contemporary Romance)

by Sophie Weston

‘I did,’ said Emilio with satisfaction.

  They slept at last. At least, Abby did. She was not sure about Emilio.

  The last thing she remembered as her eyes closed, was him holding her against the steady beat of his heart. He was looking down at her as if she was somehow magical. The feeling in his eyes made her feel shy and proud and humble all at the same time.

  She tried to say so. But sleep overtook her.

  And in the morning there was no time to tell him anything.

  The first thing she knew was a searing light across her tightly closed lids. She turned, groaning, and flung up an arm over her eyes.

  ‘Sorry,’ said Emilio, from the window where he had opened the curtains. ‘Small administrative difficulty.’

  Under the protective shade of her arm, Abby opened one eye.

  ‘Wha—?’ she said blurrily.

  ‘You might feel more comfortable getting up. My brother just rang,’ He was quietly furious. ‘He is on his way from the airport.’

  All blurriness left Abby abruptly. She sat bolt upright, the duvet slipping catastrophically. Emilio stopped glaring for a moment. His eyes gleamed appreciatively.

  ‘I’m sorry, my heart. I tried to tell him I’d meet him for coffee but his telephone kept breaking up.’

  Abby looked at her wrist. But she was no longer wearing even her watch. Emilio had removed it between slow kisses last night. It was, as far as she could remember, the last thing to go. She clutched the duvet to her breast and told herself there was no need to blush. After all, she was getting used to him looking at her like that.

  ‘What’s the time?’

  ‘Ten.’

  ‘What?’ For a moment she even forgot the way he was looking at her. ‘That’s terrible. I should have been at work an hour ago. They’ll think—’

  ‘I rang them.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Abby.

  She revised her estimate of what her colleagues at C&C would think.

  ‘In fact, I said that you wanted a week off.’

  ‘A week?’ said Abby, startled. ‘Aren’t you letting me out of bed for a week?’

  ‘A great idea,’ he said. ‘But that isn’t actually what I meant. I want you to come to Spain with me.’

  It was not quite an order, but it was not quite a question, either, Abby thought. She smiled at him lovingly.

  ‘Why Spain?’

  ‘One, I want to get you away from the press here. They’re not important but they’re a nuisance and you don’t like them. Two, I want to show you the Palacio Azul. It’s my private place. Three—’

  Abby lowered her lashes in deliberate provocation. Twelve hours ago she would not have dared. Twelve hours ago she would not have known how. She looked at him from under them, letting her eyes wander down his depressingly well-covered body.

  ‘Three?’

  She loved his little ragged gasp of arousal.

  ‘Yes,’ he said roughly.

  He came over and kissed her hard.

  ‘Stop it,’ he said, when he lifted his head. They were both breathless and the duvet had fallen to the floor. ‘Three has got to wait.’

  Abby gave him a last sensuous kiss and allowed herself to be persuaded out of bed.

  In fact, once up, she showered and dressed quickly. She was anxious to leave as soon as possible.

  ‘Stay and meet Federico,’ said Emilio, disappointed and rather surprised.

  But Abby was suffering from a recurrence of last night’s shyness. She did not think she could face someone who knew Emilio better than she did. Not until she was used to this new relationship.

  So she said, ‘I’ve got to get my passport, if we’re going to Spain.’

  It was even true.

  He let her go reluctantly. But he pressed the key into her hand before he let her over the threshold.

  ‘Don’t ever give this back to me again. It’s yours.’

  He took her face between his hands and kissed her thoroughly.

  She thought he said, ‘Like me.’

  But she was not sure. And Federico was coming. And she didn’t like to ask, in case he hadn’t said it after all.

  She had left all her personal papers in the garden flat. So she went back now. If Justine had changed the locks, she would just ring the doorbell to the main house until Justine answered.

  But her key fitted. Abby let herself into the silent flat.

  It looked oddly abandoned, although she had tried to tidy up when she left. The answering machine light was winking, too. It had to be for her, if anyone was ringing here at all. But Abby was strangely reluctant to play the message. It felt like listening in to somebody else’s life.

  But she pressed the button eventually.

  For the last time, she thought, surprised at how calm she felt.

  ‘Smudge, I don’t know if you’ll get this. It’s Dad.’ There was a horrible crackle. ‘We’ve got phone problems, darling, don’t know how long this connection will last. Just to let you know, I don’t care what the papers say. I don’t believe you would ever do anything underhand. Whatever you do, you have my support. I’m back on the twentieth. Don’t do anything drastic until then.’ Another ear-splitting crackle. But even over half the world’s static, the affection came through loud and clear as he ended in rough voice, ‘Chin up, Smudge. We’ve got through worse.’

  And then the line broke up altogether.

  Abby stared at the sagging sofa. Her eyes pricked. Dear Dad. Dear, sensible supportive Dad.

  But—don’t do anything drastic?

  Too late for that, Dad, she thought, smiling through the blur of tears.

  She looked round the dusty room that had been home for months. It felt strange. Smaller than she remembered and somehow irrelevant.

  It’s not my home, anymore, thought Abby on a flash of realisation. It was. And I was happy. And it’s in the past now. My home is wherever Emilio is.

  And, out of her subconscious the truth that had been there ever since she saw him again, strode forward into the light at last.

  I’m in love with him.

  She sat down, with her passport clasped to her breast, and let the new idea take hold. It was like being in sunshine suddenly. Blissfully, utterly, inevitably right.

  ‘I love him,’ she said aloud.

  She rushed back to him, bubbling over with the need to tell him. But he was not there.

  Instead, a younger, neater, less rangy version of him was sitting at the breakfast bar, reading his way moodily through a German newspaper.

  ‘Oh,’ said Abby, halting in the doorway.

  The neater version stood up and smiled. When he smiled, he looked like Emilio might have as a boy. Not too fierce an advance guard from the family then, Abby thought, relaxing.

  ‘You must be Abby.’ He held out his hand. ‘We’ve been waiting to meet you. Sorry to break in on you like this.’

  Abby shook his hand, bewildered. ‘But isn’t that the reason you’re here? To check up on me.’

  He looked shocked.

  ‘Good God, no. Emilio would kill me for interfering in his life.’

  Abby thought of Emilio’s expression when he opened the curtains this morning. She grinned. ‘I suppose he would.’ She looked round. ‘Where is he?’

  ‘The porters rang. They wanted him to move his car. Not well parked last night, apparently.’

  Abby suppressed a reminiscent purr. ‘No,’ she agreed. She banished the memories. ‘So why have you come over? Not a crisis, I hope.’

  ‘Well, in a way. For me. I still haven’t got up the courage to tell Emilio yet. I don’t know what he’ll say.’

  Abby sat down at the breakfast bar.

  ‘Then practise on me,’ she invited.

  It was very simple, as it turned out. Federico did not want to be an investment banker anymore. He wanted to teach.

  Abby stared. ‘So what is wrong with that?’

  ‘Well, I cost Emilio a fortune. We all did. Not just in money.’

  Suddenly, it s
eemed as if she had released a spring in Federico. Words poured out of him, like a dam bursting.

  ‘He had to give up international tennis to look after us, you know. And he was good. Really good. My sister Isabel got pregnant but she was not the only one to have problems. I was cutting school, and Ricardo was very close to becoming a criminal. Emilio stayed home and got us all back into line. But it cost him his career. He could have been one of the greats.’

  Abby did not know what to say. Federico looked at her with miserable eyes.

  ‘How can I throw it all back in his face? How can I say, “Thank you for the education and the career advice, but now I want to go home and teach kids who don’t have the luck to have the sort of elder brother I had”? He will think I don’t appreciate what he gave up for us.’

  Abby found that she did know what to say after all. ‘Did he ever say you had to be a banker?’

  ‘No,’ admitted Federico.

  ‘Did he ever tell you to earn lots of money?’

  Federico shook his head. ‘That was my idea,’ he said ruefully. ‘I wanted to show him I could do it.’

  ‘So what do you think Emilio will say if you tell him you want to teach?’

  ‘He’ll be disappointed—’

  ‘Not the Emilio I know,’ said Abby quietly.

  Federico stared.

  She stood up. ‘At least, that’s what I think. Of course, you’ve known him longer than I have.’

  ‘Yes.’ He sounded dazed.

  ‘Talk to him, anyway.’

  She went to the door. Then paused.

  ‘I should think,’ said Abby, with a long hours of shockingly total frankness vivid in her mind, ‘you could talk to Emilio about anything.’

  She heard the front door open. Her heart swung wildly.

  He’s here.

  And then—I’m in love with him.

  Her lips parted, in silence astonishment.

  This is the first time I’ll have seen him knowing I’m in love with him. I can’t do it in front of somebody else. I just can’t.

  ‘I’ll leave you to it.’

  She dived for her own old room.

  She was aware of a burning shyness. It came out of nowhere when she remembered that moment of revelation in the flat. She might be in love. But was Emilio?

  What was more, though she did not know why, she suddenly could not bear for Emilio to find her talking to his brother. Worse, talking about him.

  It was as if she had asserted rights that he had not given her. After all, she was not a member of the family. He had not asked her to be. The only time he had talked to her about his family, she had accused him of being a cold-hearted playboy. Abby pressed burning hands to her cheeks, remembering it.

  Just because Emilio now knew every inch of her body, as she knew his, it did not mean that he wanted her in the rest of his life. Had he not told her that he could not afford a wife? That his shareholders would not tolerate it? None of that would have changed, no matter how much his chivalry prompted him to ask her to marry him.

  And her being in love with him was an irrelevance.

  No, face the truth, Abby. You’ve been talking to Federico as if you belong to his brother Emilio. More, as if his brother Emilio belongs to you. But get rid of the good manners and the explosive sex, and fundamentally you are just a girl who has spent one night with him.

  She leaned her hot forehead against the window. She stared at the garden court below, not seeing the small early iris, the newly blooming daffodils. Not seeing anything.

  Of course that was what she was. He did not care what the papers said about her because it was basically true. Oh, he had asked her to marry him, all right. But that was just a ploy to get rid of journalists. He did not even care about them. It was that lethal protectiveness again.

  I don’t want him to protect me, thought Abby, in painful discovery. I want him to love me.

  But if he loved her he would have asked her to marry him and meant it. Asked her last night, when she would have agreed in a second. When she was in his arms and surrendering every last secret to him. Surrendering gladly.

  Surely he must have known that, a man of his experience? Of course he had known it.

  So if he had not asked her to marry him last night, it was because he did not want to.

  Face it, she told herself. Live with it. He calls you his heart but he never said he loved you. And he said almost everything else last night. So if he didn’t say it, he didn’t feel it.

  Go to Spain with him, fine. Enjoy what you can while you can. One day you will join the list of Callies and Floritas and Rosannas in the columnists’ files on Emilio Diz. If you can’t face that, get out now.

  But she did not.

  There were tears she did not remember crying on her cheeks. She listened to the blur of male voices beyond the hall and did not move.

  Emilio knocked on her door.

  She called, ‘Come in’ but did not turn round.

  ‘Got your passport?’

  ‘Yes.’

  He did not seem to notice anything wrong.

  ‘I’ve got us on a flight at one. We’re in first class and we’ll only take hand baggage. So there will be minimal check-in. Still, we’re cutting it fine. Can you do it?’

  Abby steadied her voice. Could she do it? Of course she could. If you were in love, you took what you could get and gave all you were allowed to give for as long as you could manage.

  ‘I can do it.’

  Emilio hesitated. ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘Yes.

  ‘Great.’ He sounded on top of the world ‘Well, then. Five minutes to pack and then we’re off on the big adventure.’

  When he said five minutes, that’s what he meant. Abby stuffed washing things and a change of clothes into a bag at random.

  This time he did not knock. He came into the room as if he had every right to walk in on her without hesitation. As perhaps he had now.

  He looked vibrant with barely curbed energy.

  ‘Ready?’

  Abby swallowed. No, of course she was not ready. She was about to shatter her whole life. How could you be ready for that?

  She brushed the tearstains away surreptitiously. Straightened. Turned.

  ‘Let’s go,’ she said quietly.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  ABBY had been half afraid that the press would trace them, either to the airport in London or in Granada. But she should have realised that Emilio would arrange everything more efficiently than that. At the Spanish airport they transferred from their first-class seats to a waiting helicopter without even entering the airport building.

  Her passport was whisked away on the outward flight and returned to her on the helicopter.

  ‘How clever of you not to bring too much luggage,’ said Emilio, tucking a frond of hair behind her ear possessively.

  Abby grinned. ‘Like you gave me so long to pack.’

  ‘And you rose to the challenge magnificently. What a team we make.’

  Abby’s grin faded. ‘Sure.’

  He looked at her shrewdly. ‘What is it?’

  ‘I—er—I’ve never been in a helicopter before,’ said Abby. ‘I think I’m probably a bit scared.

  ‘No need.’

  ‘I know.’ She had pulled herself together. ‘I’m not usually such a scaredy-cat. Sorry.’

  ‘Don’t apologise. It gives me a great excuse to hold your hand.’

  And he did, all the way there.

  The Palacio Azul was a surprise. It was not a palace, for one thing, but a two-storey farmhouse, built round a central courtyard. For another thing, it was not blue but white, with a scarlet-tiled roof. And for a third, it was on the top of a mountain peak, or so it seemed to Abby.

  ‘This is the middle of nowhere,’ she gasped, as the helicopter lowered itself onto a flat area of tarmac behind the house.

  ‘It’s private,’ conceded Emilio. ‘That’s why I bought it.’

  ‘I thought you were supposed to
be turning it into a sports complex,’ said Abby. ‘That’s what the Montijos said.’

  And then blushed to her ears as she realised how revealing it was that she should remember such an insignificant detail from that encounter nine years ago.

  Emilio raised his brows. But all he said was, ‘That was the land on the coast. I’ve always kept the house just for me. It was the first place I ever owned where there were trees.’

  He helped her out of the helicopter and ran with her into the house. The helicopter took off again. As the sound of the ailerons died away, Abby thought she had never heard such silence in all her life.

  ‘Are we alone?’

  ‘I thought you would prefer it,’ said Emilio. ‘I told the couple who look after the home farm to get in food and leave us on our own. But I can change that if you’d rather be waited on hand and foot.’

  Abby swallowed. ‘No’

  But it was still rather alarming to be so completely isolated with him.

  ‘Abby, what’s wrong?’ he said quietly. ‘Have you changed your mind?’

  She shook her head. What would he say if she said, ‘No. Just fallen in love with you’? Abby wondered.

  How long was she going to be able to keep that secret? She had not kept anything else from him. She had not wanted to. But this was one secret he would not want to know, she thought sadly.

  This game of theirs was so fragile. Falling in love was too real. Falling in love would spoil the fantasy.

  So when he said, ‘Let me show you my trees,’ she put her hand in his and went with him like a careless nymph following a god into his bower, heedless of the consequences.

  It was nearly dark. There was chill in the air under the trees. Abby shivered.

  Emilio took off his jacket and swung it round her shoulders. It smelled of him, that elusive, utterly individual fragrance of skin and clean cotton and books that she would now always associate with him. In pure instinct, she rubbed her face in it, holding the collar up to her nose like a fine cigar.

  His arm tightened.

  ‘She’s back,’ he said in an odd voice.

  Abby did not understand. ‘What?’

  ‘The girl who lectured me on the scent of roses.’

  ‘Oh.’

  She had forgotten that. She had remembered dancing with him. She had remembered the stars, the kiss, the rejection. But not those moments in the hidden garden while she told him about her home and he had listened almost hungrily.