The Spaniard's Inconvenient Wife (3 page)

So he kept on walking. Just putting one foot in front of the other, making himself take his time, not rushing, just strolling—apparently easily. One foot in front of another. He didn’t even trouble to make the effort to shut the door, managing to resist the temptation to slam it closed behind him, and cut himself off from Doña Medrano’s watchful dark chocolate eyes as she watched him go. And all the way down the long, thickly carpeted corridor he felt the burn of her gaze on him, following him, searing into the strong, taut line of his back, watching and waiting until he came to the staircase at the far end.

Then, just as he turned to go down those stairs he finally heard her voice. Heard her shout after him, her voice floating down the corridor to him.

‘Not if my life depended on it, Señor Dario! That’s what I said and that’s what I meant. And it’s certainly going to take a whole lot more than just one kiss to make me change my mind.’

‘Then at least we both agree on something.’

Oh, who was she trying to kid? Estrella asked herself,
watching as Ramón waved a careless hand in her direction before marching down the stairs and out of sight. If he had looked back just for a second he would have known her words for the lie they were. He would have seen the way that her eyes followed him, the magnetic effect that every movement, every tilt of his head, every stretch of a muscle had on her so that she could not drag her gaze away. She was sure that he would have seen the dryness of her lips, the hectic flags of colour in her cheeks that were the result of her wildly accelerated heartbeat, and known them as the signs of her uncontrollable response to his ardent kisses.

He had been so right. Appallingly, shockingly, devastatingly right.

‘Not if my life and the whole of the future of mankind depended on it.’ Miserably she repeated the wild, overblown claim that she had flung after him in an unthinking fury of emotion as she watched him walk away, shaking her head in despair at her own weakness, her own stupidity.

Nothing could have been further from the truth.

She had been his, ripe, ready and available. All he would have had to do was to press his claim a little more, kiss her a little longer, touch her, caress her where she had so ached to be touched, and she would have been his without a moment’s hesitation, right here on the floor if that was what he had asked of her.

She still would be, she realised on a shivering blend of fear and tingling delight. If he came back. If she heard his footsteps ascending the staircase again instead of heading downwards. If he appeared at the end of the corridor now and opened his arms she would fly into them, like a bird heading home to its nest. And she would be totally at his mercy, willing to do whatever he asked, however he asked.

She had barely found the strength to resist him this time. She very much doubted that she could ever manage it again.

‘Oh, damn you, Ramón Dario!’

The words exploded from her in a fury of emotion, but whether that emotion was anger, or loss, or just the plain bitterness of physical frustration, even she couldn’t tell. So instead she gave in to childish petulance, reaching out and slamming the door shut with as much force as she could muster, glorying in the way that the violent sound echoed and reverberated round the room.

‘Damn, damn, damn, damn, damn you!’

Just what was happening to her? How could things be like this so hard, so fast?

She had thought that she loved Carlos Perea, but she had insisted on waiting…

But she wasn’t in love with this man. How could she be? She had only known Ramón Dario for— A swift glance at the big clock on the wall told her that it was not even half an hour since she had walked into the room. Not even thirty minutes since her father had sent her here to meet the latest of the prospective husbands he believed his money had bought for her.

But with Ramón Dario time hadn’t meant anything. She had felt the kick of response deep inside in the first moment she had looked at him. It was as if she had known her destiny. As if her body had recognised a master, the other piece of the jigsaw, someone she was programmed to respond to no matter what.

She was only fooling herself if she thought that, if Ramón called to her, she would be able to resist. She hadn’t a hope of holding back from him, no matter how she tried. She might just as well admit that to herself and face the facts, once and for all.

The one, the only good thing about this situation was the fact that, after the way that they had parted, the way that Ramón had stalked to the door and down the corridor away
from her, not even sparing her a single glance back, there was no chance that they would ever meet again. If they never met again, then she would never have to struggle with temptation in a fight that she knew she was bound to lose.

If she never saw Ramón Dario again, then she was safe. Safe from him and from herself.

That thought was supposed to comfort her. It should have comforted her.

But in fact it had exactly the opposite effect.

R
AMÓN
kicked the door to behind him, tossed his keys onto the nearby dresser and rubbed his hands tiredly over his face before surveying his empty, silent apartment with a grim expression on his dark features.

Something had happened in the past couple of weeks. He wasn’t at all sure just what it was or how to explain this new set of feelings he was plagued with. He only knew that nothing seemed to be the same any more.

A fortnight ago, his life had been his own, with everything planned out, everything just the way he wanted it.

Except for one thing.

He had wanted the Medrano Television Company and he had been determined to get it. And because of that one thing, it seemed that his life had been turned upside down.

No.

Raking his fingers through his hair, he massaged the muscles of his skull that always seemed to be so tight and tense these days.

It was not because of the television company that things didn’t seem in control. It was because he had met Estrella Medrano. It was because of her that his life no longer felt as if it were his own.

He needed a drink.

On the way to the kitchen to find a large bottle of wine— the best his brother Joaquin’s vineyard could produce—he noticed that the light on the telephone answering machine was flickering wildly and a glowing red number announced that he had five messages waiting.

That was hardly surprising. He had been preoccupied with so many things in the past couple of weeks that he had barely even touched base at his apartment. The time he hadn’t spent working he had been at his father’s home, or checking on Joaquin and how he was recovering from his recent accident. Pausing to press the ‘play’ button, he headed to the kitchen.

‘Ramón, where are you, man?’

The sound of his other brother’s voice made Ramón grin. A brand-new and hopelessly besotted father, Alex liked nothing better than to bore the rest of the family with tales of his tiny daughter, and just how wonderful she was. He’d missed a couple of bulletins this week, and clearly Alex was determined that he should catch up.

He’d opened the wine and was pouring it into a glass when the machine clicked, beeped, then moved on to the next message.

‘Señor Dario?’

It was a female voice, low and slightly hesitant.

The bottle crashed down onto the worktop, Ramón’s head coming up sharply, his face turning towards the kitchen door so that he could catch exactly what was being said.

The last time he’d heard that voice, it had been shouting at him down a long, elegant corridor in the Castillo Medrano.

I wouldn’t marry you if my life and the future of mankind depended on it.
The words echoed inside his head, clear as if they had just been spoken in reality.

And it’s certainly going to take a whole lot more than just one kiss to make me change my mind.

Oh, damnation, now he’d missed what she’d said, his thoughts too occupied with the past. Just what could have brought Estrella Medrano to phone him here, when she had vowed never to see him again?

The third message, something unimportant and uninteresting about work, was already almost finished, and he was just about to press ‘replay’ for Estrella Medrano’s message when the fourth one took over.

‘Señor Dario? I’ve been trying to get in touch with you.’

She’d rung again!

Once more Ramón stood frozen, his wineglass halfway to his mouth, his mind busy, trying to work out just why the woman who had told him that he was tenth in the line of possible suitors for her hand—and she still wouldn’t have him!—would now want to contact him so urgently.

The answering machine message told him nothing. Just that she had been trying to get in touch with him; she had called the flat before—which of course he knew—and she would try again.

She’d left no number, he noted. Nor had she suggested that he try to ring her.

Once again he was about to press replay when the doorbell rang, distracting him that way instead.

‘I was just going to answer your call,’ he said as he pulled the door open. ‘There was no need for you to be so impatient about my getting back…’

The words faded from his tongue as he saw who stood outside, in the hallway beyond the door.

Not one of his brothers. Not his secretary who had left a message that she had some papers he needed to sign. Not even his young sister, Mercedes, who had clearly had something on her mind—some man on her mind—the last time he had seen her.

No one he was expecting.

Instead, it was the last person on earth he might have anticipated.

‘You!’

Estrella Medrano stood on the landing, her shoulders
hunched rather defensively, her hands pushed into the pockets of the light linen jacket she wore with faded denim jeans and a soft white tee shirt.

‘What are you doing here?’

‘I thought you knew.’

‘How the hell would I know?’

He knew his tone was too sharp. If he hadn’t been able to hear it for himself, then the way she took half a step back, the set of her shoulders growing even more tense, would have told him that straight away. But he wasn’t capable of controlling his tongue, or of putting on any carefully polite act just to please her. It had been a long, difficult day, at the end of a couple of long, difficult weeks and he was in no mood for playing social games with a woman who, the last time he had been in her company, had made it plain that she never wanted to see him again.

‘You said you were going to get back to me.’

‘That was before I knew it was you. I thought you were someone else,’ he amended with pointed care. ‘I was expecting my secretary.’

‘I see. If it’s inconvenient, I can go…’

‘No.’

Now how the hell had that happened? He’d opened his mouth to say yes. Yes, it was terribly inconvenient. Yes, he wanted her to go. Yes, he’d meant it when he’d said that he wanted nothing more to do with her.

But somehow his subconscious had overridden his conscious thoughts and he had come out with the exact opposite.

‘No—come in.’

In his own ears, his voice betrayed too much. It gave away the raw, unsettled feeling that had clawed at him in the first few moments of seeing this woman again. Just the sight of her brought back all the disturbed and restless nights
he’d endured since he had walked out of the Castillo Medrano without looking back.

He had walked away but he hadn’t been able to leave her behind, not in his thoughts. She had haunted his days and plagued his nights, the image of her beautiful face, her tall, slender form and long black hair filling his dreams. And those dreams had held the most potently erotic images he had ever known. Images of himself and this woman in bed together, of her warm, silken body pressed up against his, her long legs entwined with his, her mouth on his…

‘No!’ he said again, knowing that it was his own thoughts he was speaking to, not her, and had to hastily add on again, ‘It’s not inconvenient at all.’

The waft of her perfume as she walked past him, blended as it was with the light scent of her skin, was almost his undoing, making him swallow hard and force his mind to anything other than his body’s immediate, hard reaction to her presence. He hoped to hell that she’d say what she had to say and get out of there fast.

As it was, he knew he was heading for another restless and sweat-soaked night. He took a hasty swallow of his wine in an effort to cool his rising temperature.

‘Can I get you a drink?’ he asked, suddenly remembering his manners.

‘Thank you—yes.’

She looked almost as grateful as if he had thrown her a lifeline, which made him ask himself just why she was here. What was so important that she would overcome her dislike of him enough to come to his home? And how much polite small talk would they have to make before he could get her to say what it was?

‘Red wine okay?’

‘That would be perfect.’

‘I’ll get you a glass.’

To his horror she followed him into the kitchen when he had been hoping for a few much-needed seconds to pull himself together. His skin felt as if he were suffering from pins and needles, and his awareness of her was like a burn through every nerve.

The clinging white tee shirt outlined the rich swell of her breasts and emphasised the narrowness of her waist. And if her neat, pert bottom had been temptation enough under the slim-fitting black skirt, then in the tight, tight jeans it was a source of purely physical agony to look and not to be able to touch. Her long, lustrous black hair was caught up in a high pony-tail at the back of her head and the severely smooth hairstyle revealed her perfect features with dramatic clarity. Only the faintest touch of make-up enhanced the lush thickness of her eyelashes, the soft, seductive curves of her mouth.

He had thought that she was stunning in the simple elegance of her blouse and skirt, but the more casual clothes teased and tormented when their suggestion of informality blended with her careful physical distance. Wherever she moved, the traces of her scent lingered in the air, making his gut twist in instinctive reaction every time he breathed in.

Wine in hand, he led her through into the living room and settled her in a big, soft chair covered in caramel leather while he stayed on his feet, leaning against the carved wooden mantelpiece some distance away.

‘So to what do I owe the honour of this visit?’ he asked when it became obvious that she was not going to be the one to break the stiffly awkward silence that had formed between them. ‘I take it there is a point to it? You didn’t just come to see how the other half live?’

‘Oh, no—it wasn’t that at all.’

‘Then would you mind telling me what it is?’

How—just how—did she answer that? Estrella asked herself privately. This whole idea had seemed so amazing, so scarily impossible, but at the same time so very right when she had thought of it. But as soon as the door had opened and she had come face to face with Ramón once again, every last trace of any sort of confidence had vanished, leaving her feeling as if an earthquake had just opened up a huge chasm beneath her feet and she were barely clinging onto the sides by her nails.

She had forgotten how tall he was, how imposing, and, even though she was prepared for it, the impact of his devastating dark looks was like a punch in the face, making her senses reel. He had clearly just got back from the office or somewhere similar and the silvery grey shirt he wore together with the trousers of another impeccably tailored suit—black this time—emphasised and enhanced the lean, hard lines of his powerfully masculine frame.

The suit jacket had been discarded somewhere, the burgundy and black tie tugged loose and a single button at the neck of the shirt pulled open and left unfastened. In the space it revealed, an expanse of long, tautly muscled throat was exposed, the sleek skin tanned warmly golden by the sun.

Just to look at him dried her mouth. And although she knew that nerves were partly the cause of it, she was painfully aware of the fact that there were other, less fearful causes to contend with. Her pulse thudded at her temples and she knew it wasn’t just apprehension that made it race in that way.

‘Well?’ Ramón enquired cynically, clearly impatient at her hesitation. ‘Why are you here?’

‘I—I needed to talk to you.’

‘What about—another marriage proposal?’

Estrella’s throat closed up sharply at the question and she
had to swallow hard to ease the painful tightness and constriction.

‘I…’ she began but her voice cracked and failed her. Even another hasty sip of wine did nothing to ease the situation.

‘What is this, Doña Medrano? Has your father sent you to try and get me to change my mind? Or perhaps you couldn’t bring yourself to tell him that yet another man had turned you down and so he wants to know what my answer will be.’

Estrella winced inwardly at the sting of his sarcasm and tried to sit up straighter, forcing herself to meet the scathing silvery gleam of his narrowed eyes.

‘My father doesn’t know that I’m here.’

That surprised him. Just for a second he let it show in his face, his eyes opening wide, his head going back slightly. But a moment later he had himself back under control and a coolly assessing, guarded look masked his carved features.

‘He doesn’t? So where does he think you are?’

‘With friends. I told him I was going to visit my old school friend in town.’

‘And you neglected to tell him that this “old school friend” was in fact me?’

‘Mmm.’

It was all that she could manage, her voice deserting her again. She knew how it must seem, it all sounded so underhand and cloak-and-daggerish, and she could see from the look on his face that he was both deeply suspicious and slightly intrigued, in spite of himself.

She would concentrate on that ‘intrigued’, she told herself. At least if she had piqued his curiosity he was unlikely to actually throw her out until she had explained. When she had decided to come here, she hadn’t really known whether he would even let her in the door. She had had visions of being dismissed without a word, of having the door
slammed in her face before she had a chance to explain. When she had anticipated that sort of reception, this was progress.

‘Even more interesting,’ Ramón murmured with deceptive silkiness. ‘Not only do you turn up out of the blue, when you swore you never wanted to see me again, but you also lie to your
papá
in order to do so. Which makes me wonder just why this visit is so important to you.’

It was now or never. Estrella swallowed some more wine in the hope it would give her courage. She hadn’t actually decided to go through with this yet. The idea that she had come up with had seemed like the perfect answer in the middle of the night, in the darkness of her room at the
castillo.
But here, in the light of day, in Ramón’s elegant apartment, and with the man himself towering above her as he stood beside the big, carved fireplace, all her convictions had deserted her. And the daring—the audacity—that had brought her here today was rapidly seeping away from her as if there were holes in her toes through which all her strength was leaking out.