by Jennie Lucas
“I respect you, Annabelle.”
Sure, she thought bitterly, he respected her. And he would keep on respecting her, right until the moment she surrendered in his bed.
When he’d comforted her last night after her nightmare, she’d felt cherished, protected, even safe.
Safe? She mocked the thought. Stefano Cortez, safe? He was the opposite of safe. He was a heartless, selfish playboy. If she allowed him to seduce her, if she gave him her virginity, he might give her pleasure, yes. But he’d be gone by dawn. And she’d have sold her soul for that brief illusion of being cherished and protected.
“You don’t respect me.” Annabelle shook her head stonily. “I’ll have the magazine send another photographer.”
“You’re the only one I want.”
“You should have thought of that before.”
“You can’t drive to London,” Stefano said roughly. “You heard what the doctor said.
You need to stay off your feet.”
“I’ll take a taxi to the airport and send for my truck later.”
“I won’t let you go.”
Folding her arms to hide the tremble of her hands, Annabelle glared at him. “You can’t keep me here against my will.”
In the gray shadows of the shuttered bedroom, Annabelle felt warm air blow against her skin from the ceiling fan. She felt the dark power of Stefano’s gaze and shivered. Maybe she was wrong. Santo Castillo was his own private estate, the empire he ruled, with a staff loyal to him alone. For all she knew, Stefano could keep her here against her will.
The air between them hummed with electricity as he started to move toward her.
Swiftly, Annabelle swerved her feet around the side of the bed, starting to rise to her feet. Stefano stopped her with a heavy hand on her shoulder.
“Don’t go,” he said quietly. “Rest. We’ll talk later.”
“There’s nothing to talk about. Let me go.” He exhaled. “Please.”
That single humble word stopped her as nothing else could. His dark eyes gazed at her with passion, yearning.
He looked at Annabelle as she’d dreamed her whole life of a man looking at her.
“You’ve had a difficult time,” he said in a low voice. “Traveling from Portugal. Your bad dream last night. You’re exhausted. Please. Stay. Rest. Then we’ll talk.”
Annabelle looked at the hard lines of his body. She thought of fighting past him to call a taxi, or physically trying to hop her way on one foot downstairs to her truck in the garage.
Not appealing. Nor was it a happy thought to imagine dropping out of her assignment at the eleventh hour. Aside from what it would do to her professional reputation, she would personally know she’d fled here like a coward.
She could just imagine the juicy gossip that would be whispered behind her back. The stud of Santo Castillo, people would nod knowingly, has claimed even the ice queen as his victim.
Annabelle hissed through her teeth at the thought—of having the whole world think Stefano had seduced her.
He stared down at her. “Please, querida.”
Crossing her arms, Annabelle glared at him.
“Fine. I’ll stay. For a while.” He gave a single nod. “Did you have breakfast?”
She shook her head.
“I’ll bring you a tray.” Rising to his feet, he pointed toward a button beside the bed.
“Ring if you need anything.” He paused. “You promise you won’t try to leave?”
“I won’t try to hop down the stairs on one foot or fling myself out the window, if that’s what you mean.”
“Bien,” he said. “As long as I have your word.” Taking her hand, he started to lift it to his lips. A deep tremble went through her, but he stopped before his lips touched her skin.
“Ah,” he said. “I almost forgot. You do not wish me to kiss any part of you.” Looking down at her with his inscrutable dark eyes, he straightened with a mischievous grin. “Rest now.”
Rest? She fidgeted. “What am I supposed to do in bed all day?”
His lips curved. “I’m sure you’ll find a way to keep busy.” He brought her laptop and printer from the desk over to her side table. “Here. Now you can work. Although—” he tilted his head, his dark eyes bright “—if you ask me, there are far more interesting ways you could spend a day in bed….”
She scowled. “I’m not interested in hearing what you like to do in bed!”
“You’re already thinking about kissing me, aren’t you?”
“No!”
He gave her a wicked half grin. “You’re wondering what it would be like, how it would feel, if I pulled you into my arms and stroked your skin.” He leaned forward. “If I slowly kissed up and down the length of your body. Your breasts. Your thighs. If I tasted you with my tongue.”
Heat roared through her, and she couldn’t breathe. “I …”
With a low laugh, he turned away. “Perhaps I can’t kiss you, bella,” he said, “but I can dream of you tonight. All night long.” His voice was almost a purr as he walked away from her. “Ah, querida, the things you let me do to you in my dreams …”
“I wouldn’t do any of that!” she cried after him. But he’d already left, closing the door behind him.
Annabelle stared at the closed door sulkily.
The things you let me do to you in my dreams …
Lying in bed, with her ankle still propped up and wrapped in ice, she stared out through the open French doors of her veranda. Even from here, she could see the green forest where he’d kissed her. Her lips still tingled from the memory of his mouth on hers. She could still feel how he’d held her against his hard, naked chest as his lips had seized hers, pushing her mouth wide, taking her as his right—
Stop!
She would work. Yes. Work. Booting up her laptop, she opened up her email and scanned new messages. There were invitations to various lavish parties in London and work-related notes from Geography World magazine about her upcoming trip to Patagonia and Tierra del Fuego. Annabelle blinked when she saw an email from Mollie Parker, the daughter of their former gardener at Wolfe Manor. Mollie was a kindhearted soul, one of the few friends that Annabelle still remained in contact with from her old village. She opened the message.
Just got back from Italy, and I’m feeling like a new woman. Except I’d barely decided to change my gardening business to landscape design when your brother Jacob insisted I make Wolfe Manor my first project. I’ll spare you the gory details, but he left me no choice.
After so many years, it’s strange and a bit overwhelming to see him every day now. But he has thrown himself into renovating the house like a man possessed.
Wolfe Manor had fallen into disrepair after Annabelle had left to study photography in London, but it was now being renovated. Jacob was back in England after all these years.
Annabelle hardly knew which surprised her more.
Jacob. Annabelle closed her eyes. If he hadn’t saved her from their father almost twenty years ago, she would have died at fourteen. She had no doubt of that. Someday, she would have to thank him. But after all these years, she was afraid to even speak of those terrible days. The last time she’d tried to talk to Jacob about it, he’d left Wolfe Manor the next morning, and disappeared into two decades of exile.
She’d driven him away with her heartbroken tears that night. She drove everyone away, somehow.
With a deep breath, Annabelle looked back at her laptop screen.
It’s strange and a bit overwhelming to see him every day now, Mollie had said.
Annabelle remembered the helpless schoolgirl crush the gardener’s daughter had once had on Jacob. Her eldest brother, the Wolfe heir, had barely noticed her.
Annabelle wondered morosely if any woman ever knew how to love a man in a way that was good for her.
Staring through the window at the blue Spanish sky and distant green forest, she touched her lips. After thirty-three years, she’d finally been kissed. And her first kiss had been
from a master.
For the second time in her life, there would always be a mark. Another before. Another after. All because Stefano Cortez had kissed her.
Work, she ordered herself. She turned resolutely back to the screen. She typed a reply to Mollie, then, plugging her camera into her laptop, she transferred the newest images to her computer. She looked through one shot after another of wide golden fields, cragged green mountains, horses galloping through the slowrising mist of dawn.
Annabelle paused, her fingers stilled over one image.
The single picture she’d taken of Stefano in the stables that morning shone with vividness and energy. She’d caught him unaware, while he was shoveling straw. The slant of dawn’s golden light from the windows illuminated the sheen of his tanned skin. Dark hair laced the muscles of his bare, muscled chest. His masculine beauty made her catch her breath.
She paused. She closed her eyes.
And she deleted the picture.
She nearly cried doing it. Her photographer’s soul screamed not to destroy the beautiful image. But it was her only hope of survival—to erase Stefano from her heart.
There was a knock on her door. She looked up, her cheeks hot with guilt and grief.
“Come in.”
“Here’s breakfast.” Stefano brought in a tray and put it on her lap. She looked down to see ham and eggs, toast and fruit. “I got this from the kitchen. I brought both coffee and tea, since I didn’t know which you’d prefer.”
“Thanks.” Mechanically, she took a bite of toast. She poured cream into her tea, then drank a sip of the hot black coffee. She looked up at him and said in a dead voice, “I’ve decided to stay and finish my assignment.”
A smile lit up his handsome face. “Bien. I knew you would—”
She held up a hand, cutting him off. “You must never kiss me again.”
His brow lowered. “Why? You disliked it?”
She sucked in her breath. “No. That would be a lie. When you kissed me …” She swallowed, then tried to keep her voice even as she said, “You kiss very well. Of course you do. You’re famous for it.”
He blinked at her cool tone.
“But being close to you impairs my judgment,” she said. “It impairs my ability to do my job with clear eyes. And like I said … my work is what matters.”
“But, Annabelle, surely.” He reached to take her hand, but she pulled it away, folding her hands tightly in her lap.
He stared down at her, his eyes dark.
“Do not pursue me,” she said. “Please. Let me finish the job I came here to do.” In spite of her best efforts, her voice trembled and broke as she looked up at him with tears in her eyes. “If you have any mercy in your heart,” she whispered, “leave me alone.”
Chapter Six
Stefano rubbed his hair with a towel as he got out of the shower. Lathering his face in front of the mirror, he shaved with a straight razor. He froze at the sight of his haggard face.
He’d had three days of staying away from Annabelle now. Three days of leaving her alone. Three days of telling himself it was all for the best.
Three days of hell.
Setting his jaw, he toweled off the rest of his body and left the en suite bathroom, padding naked across his bedroom to the closet. He was still furious with himself.
He should have known better than to kiss her in the forest. He’d tamed enough horses to know that rushing Annabelle into a kiss, after she’d just run away from him in blind fear, was a mistake.
And yet he hadn’t been able to stop himself. What a kiss. When she’d kissed him back with her trembling heart-shaped mouth, it had been heaven. He’d very nearly ripped off her clothes right then and there in the forest, and taken her against the rocks. Against a tree. In the water. Anywhere.
Annabelle’s kiss had been so raw, so un-practiced, so real. She’d clearly taken very few lovers in her life, a chosen, sacred few. He’d felt it when he’d kissed her, in her shaking lips as they separated beneath the force of his caress. She did not surrender herself lightly.
He’d felt her shock, her hesitation. Then, like a miracle, he’d felt her fire.
A man would die for a kiss like that.
Stefano should have felt privileged beyond imagination. Instead, he greedily wanted more. Hungered for it. Thirsted.
If once he’d been intrigued by her, now he was obsessed.
But Annabelle’s face had been so wan as she lay stretched out on the bed, her injured ankle extended and wrapped in ice. She’d looked up at him, her expression heartbroken as she’d whispered, “If you have any mercy in your heart, leave me alone.”
He’d sucked in his breath at the pain in her eyes.
“Is that truly what you wish?” he’d replied.
She lifted her chin fiercely, her gray eyes glittering with tears like melted ice.
“It is.”
“Then I give you my word,” he’d said in a low voice.
And he’d left her, when all he’d wanted to do was take her in his arms and kiss away the gleaming tears he’d seen in her eyes. It had been the first moment of hell, and since then, it had only gotten worse.
For three days, he’d had only glimpses of Annabelle as she photographed the ranch.
He’d seen her laughing with the boys in the dining hall, even chatting with the elderly housekeeper about her grandchildren in the nearby village.
Annabelle Wolfe, an ice queen? He gave a single hard laugh. She was charming and warm with everyone. Everyone, except him. When she passed Stefano in the hall, if she met him in the stables, her eyes seemed to glaze over as if she saw right through him. He’d become invisible to the woman he wanted most on earth.
Now, setting his jaw, Stefano pulled a clean T-shirt and jeans from his wardrobe.
Sitting on his bed, he put on his black work boots. Then he paused, staring blindly across his masculine, Spartan bedroom.
For three days now, he’d tried to convince himself it was better this way—better for her, better even for him. He shouldn’t risk getting more involved with a woman who cried out with nightmares she wouldn’t explain, a woman so powerful on the outside but so fragile inside.
He’d already slept an entire night at her side. He’d put her needs ahead of his own.
Shocking. He’d never wanted a weighty affair. All he’d wanted with Annabelle Wolfe was a pleasant challenge and bit of fun. This was getting too serious. He should let her go.
But his body wouldn’t listen. He wanted her.
Gripping his hands into fists, Stefano rose to his feet. Going downstairs, he went to the dining hall for breakfast.
He found the plump, gray-haired housekeeper, Mrs. Gutierrez, setting down bowls of freshly baked rolls on the long table. All the young stablehands bounced around her, noisy in their hungry eagerness. The teenagers, as usual, stacked food on their plates perilously high as they cheerfully wished him buenos días. Stefano growled out a reply and went straight to his usual chair, where he poured himself some black coffee. He drank deeply of the hot, bitter brew, burning his tongue.
“Good morning,” he heard Annabelle’s sweet voice say. Stefano put down his cup on the table and looked up.
The sight of her took his breath away.
She was sleek and professional as always, wearing a pantsuit in creamy ivory and glossy black shoes beneath. Her blond hair was pulled back in her usual tight chignon. Small gold hoops gleamed in her ears and she carried a black leather case.
But the ivory of her suit was nothing compared to the creamy color of her skin. The gold of her earrings was dull compared to the lustrous blond gleam of her hair. Her bare lips were naturally pink and full, her big gray eyes fringed with light blond lashes. And it was all Stefano could do not to fall to his knees before such beauty.
Annabelle froze when she saw him. Then her soft gray gaze became inscrutable. She turned away.
He wondered what she was thinking. If the past three days had been as difficult for her as th
ey’d been for him. Usually women fell over themselves to share their thoughts. But Annabelle didn’t say a word.
The young stablehands saw her and rose to their feet to greet her, clustering around as they asked about her welfare in Spanish and accented English.
“Señorita, good morning!”
“Miss Wolfe, did you bring the pictures?”
“You fool, don’t ask her yet. Let her sit down first!”
Annabelle gave a laugh like the ripple of cool water in a mountain stream. “Yes. I brought the photos. Just let me have a bit of breakfast and I’ll be glad to show you.”
The boys cheered, then escorted Annabelle to her seat on the other end of the long table. Stefano tightened his hands on his coffee cup, willing himself into self-control.
At any other time, he would have been proud of the teenagers for showing such good manners, falling over themselves to make a guest comfortable. But as he saw the delighted, warm smile that Annabelle bestowed upon them, something like a growl rose to the back of his throat.
Stefano wanted to be the recipient of that smile.
He wanted Annabelle to look at him like that.
It was a strange feeling for him to be ignored by the woman he wanted most. Mrs.
Gutierrez, smiling, brought her a plate and she calmly served herself. Stefano watched Annabelle eat pastries, cooked eggs and ham with gusto while he drank only black coffee, feeling surly. He saw her smile and laugh as the boys entertained her with jokes, tossing rolls at one another. As usual, the teenagers were rowdy and full of laughter as they gobbled down their food and drank gallons of milk.
Beneath the dining hall’s high ceilings of vaulted wood, Annabelle sat in her tall wooden chair at the end of the table, holding court like a princess, laughing at the boys’ antics. And Stefano suddenly wondered why, at almost thirty-four, she had no children of her own. She would make a wonderful mother. Why had she never settled down and started a family?
Because she couldn’t commit? Because she was a workaholic? Because she was constantly on the road and didn’t need, or want, a real home?
All good reasons, he thought. All bad reasons.