by India Grey
Kate exhaled a shaky breath. ‘Because I suddenly realised that love is a million times stronger than that.’
The dark eyes softened as the car came to a standstill at another set of gates. ‘I leave you here, miss.’
Her hands were shaking as she reached into her bag for money and got out of the car. Her legs nearly gave way beneath her.
‘Good luck,’ the taxi driver called after her.
She handed her pass to another set of security guards, who frowned down at it for a second, then back up at her.
‘A guest of Cristiano Maresca?’
‘Where do I have to go?’ she gasped. ‘I need to find him before the race starts.’
‘Through there. But you’ll have to hurry—’
At that moment the ground beneath them began to shake with what felt like the beginnings of an earthquake. A high-pitched hum vibrated in the air, suddenly rising like a siren to an ear-splitting scream.
‘Ah…’ said the guard apologetically. ‘Sorry. Too late.’
The sun was low on the track, shining through a haze of fuel. A white plume of smoke rose up from the Ferrari in front of Cristiano as they came into the second corner, making it impossible to see.
Cristiano kept going, his lungs bursting as the acceleration pressed back on him. He was driving blind, with only his split-second reflexes between him and oblivion. And Alexander’s fossil, he thought with a sudden burst of elation as the choking cloud lifted. Another corner. On Cristiano’s nearside wing a car spun out of control, spiralling away behind him. Cristiano felt his elation die a little as he let out a vicious curse.
Silvio’s voice on the team radio was reassuring. ‘It’s OK, Cristiano. Plenty of room at the front now. Move in. Show them that you’re back.’
You don’t have to prove anything to anyone…
Swearing softly again, Cristiano hit the brakes. This wasn’t meant to happen, he thought grimly. The noise of the engine and the pressure of the G-force and the sheer bloody need to stay alive should make it impossible to hear Kate’s voice inside his head. That was why he did this—to escape the tangled mess of complicated emotions over which he had no control.
To forget.
But he couldn’t. And in that moment he felt another flashbulb sensation as the track in front of him disappeared and he remembered…
He remembered last time. Monaco. Going back to look for Kate before he got in the car. That was why he’d thought she was here today, he realised, as a clear picture of her in a blue T-shirt—his blue T-shirt?—appeared in his head.
And she had turned and smiled at him, and he had pulled her into the garages and kissed her and laughed because she had told him to drive carefully.
A shower of sparks flew up from the brakes of the car in front. Swerving out of his wake, Cristiano found some clear space on the outside of the bend.
‘Move in, move in!’ Silvio yelled over the radio. ‘You’re losing seconds!’
And suddenly it all made perfect sense. All this time he had surrounded himself with people who urged him on, wanting a piece of him, wanting him to reach higher, drive faster. And all he’d ever really wanted was someone who loved him enough to tell him to stop.
His mother had wanted that. And so did Kate.
He slowed down. Silvio was shouting so loudly in his headset that his voice was an incoherent crackle of noise. The pit lane entrance loomed in front of him and he swung in. The pit crew sprang forward, looking alarmed. Silvio appeared from behind them, pushing his way to the front, mouthing apoplectically as Cristiano brought the throbbing, shaking car to a standstill.
Yanking off his steering wheel, he levered himself up out of the car. He was fleetingly aware of cameras closing in, but then something else caught his eye, making his head snap round as forcefully as if he’d just taken a corner at one hundred and eighty miles an hour.
Kate.
It was Kate.
She was standing behind Silvio, both hands pressed to her mouth in a way that in that single, incredulous, sunlit moment made him think of when they’d made love in her brass bed in Yorkshire and she’d had to stop herself crying out.
‘What the hell are you doing?’ Silvio yelled, his face almost purple with rage. ‘The track was wide open in front of you. The car was going like a dream—’
‘I know.’
Cristiano pulled off his head support and his helmet, tossing them back into the cockpit of the car. His eyes never left Kate. He wanted to tear open his overalls and pull his beating heart from his chest, offering it to her on the palm of his hand.
‘You know? You know? Per Madre di Dio, Cristiano, the race could have been yours…’
‘I know,’ he said again, moving past Silvio and going towards her. ‘But the thing is, I just realised I don’t want it.’
The huge desert sun brushed her hair with gold-dust and turned the tears that welled in her eyes into shimmering pools of molten gold.
‘Don’t say that—please,’ she croaked hoarsely, and for a moment his heart stopped as icy fear gripped him. Real fear.
‘Kate—’
‘No. Let me finish.’ She reached up and pressed her finger to his lips, hushing him. Her throat felt as if she’d swallowed an entire desert of sand. ‘I came here to tell you—’
But the other cars, still grouped together, were coming around the circuit again, the ever-present scream of their engines rising to an ear-splitting shriek. She kept her eyes fixed on his, desperate to make herself heard above the noise.
‘To tell you that I’m sorry,’ she yelled, standing on her tiptoes to bring her mouth closer to his ear. ‘I won’t stand in the way of what you want to do. I love you so much, and I was so frightened of losing you, but you were right—a life lived in fear is no life at—’
She didn’t get any further because at that moment he captured the back of her head in one strong hand and brought his mouth down on hers, kissing her on and on as the cars streaked past on the track behind them, whipping her hair against his face. Her body arched against him, her bones melting as he held her in their own dark, sweet world. When the noise had died away again they pulled apart slowly, gazing at each other in stupefied wonder.
‘What did you say?’ Cristiano rasped, holding her face between his hands as her tears streamed over his fingers.
‘I said I love you,’ Kate sobbed. ‘I want you—on any terms. Because I’d rather have five minutes of being loved by you than five hundred years of being loved by anyone else. So if you want to get into the car and go back out there, that’s OK with me.’
‘Kate…’
He kissed her again, with a tenderness that bordered on reverence this time. Kate smiled tremulously.
‘But you’d better do it soon, because even you might struggle to make up time from an extended kissing stop in the middle of a race.’
He shook his head slowly. ‘I’m not going anywhere. I’ve finally remembered what happened last time—in Monaco. But even before that I had realised anyway. I don’t need this anymore. I don’t need to risk my neck to feel alive, or win to prove that I’m something. Not if I have you and Alexander.’
She was dimly aware of cameras whirring at a distance, as the pit crew kept back the journalists who had gathered. Happiness was rising inside her like the sun, spilling warmth and shining light into the dark corners where fear had lurked for so long.
‘You do. You will. Always.’
The sun dazzled her, making rainbows dance in the blur of tears as he stood in front of her. His face was pale, his narrow eyes black with fiercely restrained emotion. ‘Does that mean that if I asked you to marry me again you might say yes this time?’
‘Try,’ she sobbed.
Gravely, he lowered himself down onto one knee, looking for all the world like some handsome crusader in a Pre-Raphaelite painting about to be knighted. Cars screamed past on the track behind them, but the noise that used to set her teeth on edge was now nothing more than a background symphony to
Cristiano’s voice.
‘Kate Edwards,’ he said, taking her hand, ‘would you possibly be brave and foolish enough to risk joining your life to a dyslexic ex-racing driver who loves you more than he can ever say?’ He looked up at her with a crooked, heartbreakingly sexy smile. ‘Certainly on paper.’
Tipping back her head, Kate laughed, tears still cascading down her cheeks as she pulled him to his feet again. ‘You know me—I thrive on risk. Bring on the challenge—and the happy ending.’
He caught hold of her waist and gathered her into his arms. ‘Oh, no,’ he said softly, his eyes gleaming as he bent his head to kiss her again. ‘It’s not the end. This is only just the beginning…’
All the characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author, and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all the incidents are pure invention.
All Rights Reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Enterprises II B.V./S.à.r.l. The text of this publication or any part thereof may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, storage in an information retrieval system, or otherwise, without the written permission of the publisher.
This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out or otherwise circulated without the prior consent of the publisher in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
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First published in Great Britain 2010
Harlequin Mills & Boon Limited,
Eton House, 18–24 Paradise Road, Richmond, Surrey TW9 1SR
© India Grey 2010
ISBN: 978-1-4089-1952-1
* The Balfour Legacy
Table of Contents
Cover Page
Excerpt
Title Page
About the Author
Dedication
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Copyright