Why had she shunned his advice?
Had she really been so scared that allowing him to help would give him undeniable proof of her stupidity? The sad answer to that was yes. She had been scared. She hadn’t wanted to give him evidence that she was less than perfect.
She’d been honest about her past and lack of education but had tried to romanticise it, to insist she had the know-how and savvy to build her own business. She’d tried to convince herself as much as him, starting her businesses with bags of enthusiasm. But she’d been faking it.
The sad fact, one she’d never been able to bring herself to admit, was that business left her as cold as the high-powered suits she’d worn. Working at Poco Rio made her feel warm.
Hearing movement in the bedroom, she turned and found Raul with a pile of papers in his arms. He’d risen early, long before she’d hauled herself out of bed.
He put the papers on her dressing table and handed the top sheet to her. ‘Here’s a list of my schedule for the next month. The dates highlighted are when I won’t need the helicopter. You’re welcome to use it on those dates to get to and from Valencia.’
She eyed him warily. She’d thought during their meal at the pizzeria last night that they were reaching an understanding, that his time at the centre had softened his attitude towards her. He’d been quick to put her straight on that.
Nothing has changed, he’d said.
And while their lovemaking when they’d returned home had been long and tender, that counted for nothing. Raul was nothing if not a generous lover. Even when he hated her.
‘Are you saying I can work at the centre?’
‘Yes.’
‘I thought I was supposed to be glued to your hip?’
A glimmer of a smile curled on his lips. ‘I would much rather have you glued to a different part of my anatomy.’
She couldn’t help the burst of laughter that escaped and she almost responded with, ‘So would I.’ Almost.
As he’d said only the evening before, nothing had changed. He hadn’t entirely reclaimed his humanity, not when he still had her in his bed as a form of punishment.
‘I’ve been on the phone to Pierre Binoche,’ he said, referring to the interior designer he used for his hotels and cruise liners, ‘and have arranged a meeting with him at the end of the month at the new building. I assume you will want to be there?’
‘Pierre’s going to do the interior design?’ she asked in amazement. ‘That’s incredibly good of you but, really, it’s not necessary. Once all the renovations are done, all we’ll need to do is give the place a lick of paint.’
‘Pierre won’t be discussing colour charts; he’ll be looking to create the right mood for the centre. He’ll take your lead, cariño.’
‘Really?’
‘You know the brief better than anyone. Think of it as PR. His name will help in the awareness drive we’re going for.’
‘There is that,’ she conceded. This, on top of the fundraising cruise trip, would raise so much awareness and funds for the children she felt like pinching herself to make sure it wasn’t all a dream.
A thought crossed her mind. ‘When at the end of the month are we meeting him?’
‘The last Wednesday.’
‘Oh.’
‘Why?’
‘The last Wednesday of August is La Tomatina. We’re planning on taking some of the kids to it.’
‘You’re taking the children to a tomato fight?’
From the look on his face she might have said they were taking the children to watch bareknuckle boxing.
‘Just to watch. We took five of them last year and they loved it. We sat on a roof terrace with a box of tomatoes to throw at the crowd.’ La Tomatina was an annual festival in the Valencian town of Buñol.
He eyed her thoughtfully. ‘Have you already got your name down to go?’
‘Yes, but don’t worry, I wasn’t planning on stealing your helicopter again to get there.’
‘You wouldn’t have had any luck if you did—my pilots now know not to take you anywhere without my express permission.’
Only Raul could give with one hand and take with the other, one minute sounding human and reasonable, the next reminding her of her current position in his life. The difference now was that he said it with good humour rather than the horrid cold tone she’d hated so much. It made her hope he was thawing towards her.
She grinned mischievously. ‘I wasn’t going to steal your helicopter. I was going to steal your Bugatti.’
‘I am going to assume you’re joking or my blood pressure might combust.’
‘You should come with us,’ she said, speaking on impulse.
‘I think not,’ he said drily.
‘Why not? Worried you might get your clothes dirty?’
‘No.’ He shook his head.
‘Then why not?’ Her eyes were on him, peering intently. ‘Is it not becoming for a man of your standing to have a tomato fight?’
‘You know perfectly well it isn’t.’ Raul couldn’t think of anything more abhorrent than pictures of himself covered in gunk surfacing in the press and on the Internet.
‘Go in disguise.’
‘Charlotte, I’m not going to take a whole day off work to watch a lot of people throw tomatoes at each other.’
‘Don’t be such a snob. It’s fun.’
‘I’m not a snob.’
‘Not consciously,’ she conceded.
Her phone vibrated loudly. She read the message and sighed, the smile leaving her face.
Raul knew before she said anything that it was her father.
‘Dad can’t make it.’
He kept his features neutral. ‘Why?’
There was that defensive look he recognised. ‘He has a business meeting.’
‘On a Saturday?’
‘You have business meetings on Saturdays.’
‘I run a multibillion-euro company. Your father is currently jobless.’
‘Well, this is something to do with him finding a new job. You should be pleased he’s trying to find one.’
‘I am.’ Raul’s issue was that he simply didn’t believe it. Graham had most likely found himself a date and concocted a story for his daughter’s benefit rather than admitting the truth. The only good thing was that he’d had the decency to cancel in advance rather than at the last minute as he had done on numerous occasions.
The problem was, Charley didn’t want to hear it.
Shaking his head, he strolled back to her dresser and picked up the rest of the papers. ‘While you were sleeping, I also had the chance to look through the financial report you produced.’
‘And?’
A pang shot through Raul’s chest to see trepidation immediately fill her eyes.
‘You did a good job.’
The trepidation was pushed out by a ray of beaming light. ‘Really?’
Pulling her into his arms, he kissed her lightly and murmured, ‘Really.’
He’d been astounded at how good a job she had done.
All throughout their marriage he’d believed in her innate abilities, had known she needed to harness them and focus to achieve something substantial. And now he’d been proved right.
But she hadn’t believed it.
Why had he not recognised before that his wife had no confidence in herself?
She’d put on a good front, that was for certain. But they’d been married. How had he not seen her insecurities?
‘Come on,’ he said, giving her one last kiss before stepping back. ‘Get dressed—I’ve got a meeting in half an hour.’
Before leaving the room, he turned back to her. ‘Don’t feel you have to dress up for the office any more. You’re coming with me as my sex toy, remem
ber?’
His heart lightened to see the grin spread across her face. ‘Shall I dress as a dominatrix?’
‘Now that I would love to see.’
Her cackle of laughter followed him out of the room.
* * *
‘You’ve hardly stopped for the past month,’ Raul said. ‘Take the day off—go and see Marta.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes.’ His voice dropped. ‘Unless you want to come here and take me in my office.’
Even with Raul a mile away, just the suggestive sound of his voice whispering down the phone set a frisson of heat through her.
‘I’ll see you when you get home,’ she said firmly. ‘Goodbye.’
Swiping her phone to end the call, she padded over to the window and looked out at the lashing rain and palm trees swaying in the growing wind.
It was the height of summer and Barcelona was under a deluge of water.
She was supposed to be working at the centre but the circling storm had forced the pilot to ground the helicopter. She’d been on the verge of jumping in one of Raul’s cars and driving the three-hour journey there when Seve had called, insisting he had it covered and forbidding her to go in. She could only hope the weather cleared by Wednesday. She and Raul were meeting Pierre first thing, then Charley would head over to the current centre as part of the team taking the children to La Tomatina.
But today, for once, her time was her own.
A bath. That was what she needed.
It had been ages since she’d last had a long soak.
Filling the bath until it was a steamy mass of foamy water, she climbed in and lay back, closing her eyes, happy to listen to the heavy thud of rain.
When had she last felt so content?
The past few weeks had passed in a blur. She’d travelled with Raul to St Lucia to see the development of a new hotel complex, to Madrid where the headquarters of his air fleet was located, dined out with business colleagues and friends, and still managed to work a couple of days a week at the centre.
It was amazing how different everything felt. Before, when she’d travelled with him and witnessed his burgeoning empire, her inadequacies had felt strong enough to eat her whole. So she’d stopped accompanying him, using the excuse of her own businesses to keep her rooted in Barcelona. The side effect had been the jealousy that had gripped her on their nights apart, the fear of him meeting someone more suitable that had plagued her.
Now, her inadequacies didn’t matter. Her imperfections didn’t matter. She and Raul were together for a strict time period. This wasn’t permanent and, as a result, she no longer had to put on the pretence of being perfect. If he was concerned that she was less than perfect, he wasn’t saying, and, really, why would he? Come November, they would go their separate ways. They would divorce and he could then find himself the perfect wife he needed.
A lance of pain shot through her chest as she thought of him with another woman on his arm. She sucked in her breath, holding it tightly, waiting for the feeling to pass as it always did, although it seemed to be taking longer and longer for it to pass as the days went by.
She would not make the same mistakes as she had before.
Mind-blowing sex did not equate to love. That was what had got her into trouble in the first place, mistaking the lust she’d felt for him for love, then, when love truly had come, it had been too late and she’d been trapped. Worse, she’d become a stranger to herself.
But this time she knew better.
This time...
Unless you want to come here and take me in my office...
She’d told herself hell would freeze over before she made the first move. As if she would give herself willingly to the man who’d blackmailed her back into his bed.
And yet...
There would be no consequences if she walked away. Raul would never back out of the centre, not now. She’d known that since he’d turned up there and been pulled into the magic of the place.
And Raul knew it too.
She could walk away and there wasn’t a thing he could do or threaten her with to make her stay. Something told her that even if there were, he wouldn’t use it.
For over a month she’d been telling herself that she stayed because they’d made a deal, as hateful as it had initially been.
Her eyes opened with a snap as the truth hit her.
She’d stayed because she wanted to.
Raul had done a terrible thing blackmailing her back into his bed. A terrible thing. He’d believed—possibly still believed—awful things about her that she could never disprove without a lie detector but over the past month he’d treated her with something he’d never shown her in all the years of their marriage. Respect.
She hadn’t even known the respect had been missing until she’d found it.
Adrenaline coursed through her, her heart hammering as powerfully as the rain pouring like sheets against the window, her mind a train wreck of careering tracks.
Could their marriage work...?
No, it would be no good to think that way. Things had started well when they’d first met, when it had been all about the lust holding them together, before he’d dropped to one knee and pulled out the enormous diamond ring now locked securely away.
Their time limit meant this could be the fling their relationship should have been, the fling that should have ended with the summer and remained a beautiful memory.
A peace settled on her as she came to terms with the fact that she was no longer a hostage against her will but a full participant. Did she really want to waste the next few months, holding a part of herself back from him out of a sense of outrage that served nothing?
She lay back again and allowed her mind to drift away, images of their lovemaking filling her senses. If she concentrated really hard, she could feel the weight of his body upon her, the flicker of his tongue...
Suddenly she sat back up, sloshing water over the sides of the bath in her haste, as a deliciously naughty thought came into her head.
‘Unless you want to come here and take me in my office...’ Raul had said.
If she was going to be a full participant in this, then it was time to let Raul know, to put their relationship on the equal footing it deserved.
And she knew just the way.
* * *
Raul sipped at his water, forcing himself to concentrate on the letter he was dictating straight into his laptop for his PA and trying not to think of Charley at home alone, trying to rid himself of thoughts of finishing early to return to her.
The phone on his desk buzzed.
He paused mid-sentence and frowned down at it. His executive team knew he was dictating and not to disturb him.
He pressed the offending buzzer and spoke into it. ‘Is there a problem?’
‘Your wife is here,’ came the voice of Ava. ‘She says it’s important she speak to you.’
Immediately his mind went into overdrive, imagining all the things that could have driven her here, something icy clutching at his heart. This could not be anything good.
‘Let her in.’
The past month, things had been good between them. Better than he’d dreamed they could be, even when they’d first exchanged their vows and their whole future had been a blank canvas waiting for them to paint with glorious colour.
Too good. Highs were always followed by lows.
The door opened and Charley stepped in, dressed for the awful weather in a long black trench coat.
He rose from his seat. ‘Whatever’s the matter?’
A serene smile on her face, she closed the door quietly behind her.
‘Sit down,’ she said softly.
Raul would be the first to admit that confusion rarely entered his vocabulary, but right the
n... ‘What?’
Her hands went to the belt of her trench coat.
‘I said...’ her voice was quiet but knowing as she tugged the belt loose ‘...sit...’ her hands went to the lapels and pulled them apart ‘...down.’
Under her coat she was as naked as the day she’d been born.
Shrugging it off, she sashayed towards him in high black heels, her breasts moving with the motion, her nipples drawing his attention.
He blinked, suddenly certain he’d fallen asleep at his desk.
She placed a hand to his chest and pushed him back onto his chair, the height of her heels lifting her so his face was almost level with the top of her thighs.
The effect on him was instantaneous.
Her smile had lost its serenity, had become something heavy and sensual.
Placing a hand on his shoulder, she hooked a leg over his lap to straddle him, keeping her shoes on the ground so she was elevated over him. The only part of her touching him was the hand on his shoulder and her inner thighs. Not a single inch of her touched his bare skin yet he felt scorched by her touch.
Her hand slipped round his neck and she leaned forward to breathe into his ear. ‘I thought I would take you up on your offer.’
With the heavy weight of her breasts pressed against his chest and her warm scent clinging to her like a cloud, coherent thoughts were a world away.
‘Which offer?’
She moved her lips across his cheek until she reached his mouth while tracing a hand over his shirt-clad chest and down to the belt of his trousers.
‘To take you in your office.’
Her mouth didn’t move from his as she worked at his belt then unzipped him, with just a whisper of her lips touching him. He placed a hand on her waist, the warmth and softness of her skin deepening the burn in his loins.
He didn’t think he’d ever been aroused so quickly and so deeply as he felt right now or ever been as aware of the sound of his blood pumping.
A sudden urgency rippled through him and he reached down to help tug his opened trousers and boxers down enough to free him. Immediately she took hold of him.
He inhaled deeply to stop the groan that wanted to escape.
Her breaths coming out in shallow pants, she guided him to her opening, and sank down on him.
The Perfect Cazorla Wife Page 12