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Cesar’s eyes were glittering. His disdain was palpable. He might have just apologised, and surprised her by doing so, but there was no mistaking his disapproval of the entire situation.
Stung, Lexie said defensively, ‘There were two of us there.’
He was grim. ‘I’m aware of that, believe me.’
‘So...’ She swallowed painfully, thinking of the inevitable re-igniting of press interest and the weariness and fear of exposure that would provoke. ‘What now?’
Cesar looked at her for a long moment and crossed his arms. ‘We contain it.’
Lexie frowned. ‘What do you mean...contain it?’
‘We don’t give it air to breathe. You’re here in the castillo for the next four weeks. There should be no reason why it won’t die a death if they have nothing to work with.’
Something icy touched Lexie’s spine. ‘What are you talking about exactly?’
A muscle pulsed in Cesar’s jaw. ‘What I’m talking about is that you don’t leave this estate.’
Fire doused the ice. Lexie pointed at herself. ‘I don’t leave the estate? What about you?’
Cesar shrugged minutely, arrogant. ‘Well, of course I will have to leave. I have business to attend to.’
Lexie emitted a laugh that sounded far too close to panic for her liking. ‘After a passionate embrace is plastered all over the world’s press, you appear in public with me nowhere to be seen...do you know how that’ll look?’ She answered herself before he could. ‘It’ll look as if you’re rejecting me and the press will be all over it like a rash.’
Cesar’s jaw pulsed again. Clearly he was not used to having anyone question his motives. ‘You will be protected in here from the press.’
‘Oh, really?’ asked Lexie. ‘That paparazzo managed to get in, and I assume even a reclusive fossil like you has heard of camera phones?’
She was so angry right then at Cesar’s preposterous plan that she barely noticed that he’d moved around the desk, or that his eyes flashed dangerously at her childish insult.
‘What’s to stop some enterprising crew member from snapping pictures of poor jilted Lexie on the set of her new film...?’ Lexie was on a roll now, pacing back and forth. ‘The press will love documenting your exploits while I’m the rejected fool, locked in the castle.’
Lexie stopped and rounded on Cesar, who was at the other side of the desk now and far too close and tall and dark. She took a step back.
She shook her head. ‘No way. I’m not going to be incarcerated in this grim fortress just to make life easier for you. I’d planned to visit Lisbon, Salamanca...Madrid!’ That last came out with more than a little desperation.
Lexie had dark memories of being all but locked up once before, and it wasn’t going to happen again in her lifetime—not even on an estate as palatial as this one.
Cesar looked at Lexie and was momentarily distracted by her sheer vibrancy and beauty. Her cheeks were pink with indignation, her eyes huge and glittering. Her chest was heaving. As she’d paced back and forth energy had crackled around her like electricity.
Her words hit him then: I’m not going to be incarcerated in this grim fortress... He felt like cracking a bleak smile. He knew only too well what that was like. And he could sympathise with her rejection of the idea.
He rested back against his desk and crossed his arms, because right now they itched to reach out and grab her and pull her into him. So close to her like this he could smell her scent, all but feel those provocative curves pressed against him.
His body tightened, blood rushed south. He cursed silently.
‘So...what would be your suggestion, then?’
Lexie blinked. Cesar marvelled that her every thought was mirrored on that expressive face and in those huge eyes. He’d never seen anything like it. He was used to women putting on a front, trying hard to be mysterious.
She bit her lip and that was even worse. He wanted to bite that lip.
She looked at him. ‘We go public.’
Cesar’s eyes snapped up from her mouth to her eyes. His crossed arms dropped. ‘We go what?’
‘We go public,’ she repeated.
‘As in...?’
Her eyes flashed brilliant blue, like fire. ‘As in we are seen together. As in we go out in public. As in we let people think that we are having an affair.’
Cesar tensed for the inevitable rush of rejection at that proposition. He didn’t do high publicity—especially not with women like Lexie, whose second home was among the tabloids. Whose life was laid out in a series of lurid pictures amid salacious headlines.
But it didn’t come. The rejection. What did come was an intense spiking of anticipation in his already hot blood. His brain clicked and whirred at the thought of this audacious plan. The news of his half-brothers would be hitting the newsstands possibly as soon as tomorrow...
‘Well?’
Lexie’s voice cut through the snarl of thoughts in Cesar’s head. Somehow, without analysing it fully right now, he knew that a news story featuring them would inevitably be more colourful and interesting than one about his family connections. That would be diminished in favour of a far more scandalous story: Reclusive billionaire beds homewrecking Luscious Lexie.
‘I think,’ Cesar said slowly, letting his eyes fill with Lexie again, ‘that your idea has some merit.’
Some of the tension left her shoulders even as she crossed her arms, which pushed the swells of her breasts up. Dios, Cesar cursed again silently. Suddenly all rational thoughts of distracting the press via a story about him and Lexie fled, to be replaced with the very real urge to touch the woman in front of him.
‘Good,’ she said now. ‘Because I really do think that’s the best solution. And the fairest.’ Her mouth firmed. ‘I know the press, and sometimes you have to play them at their own game rather than fight them.’
She lifted her chin then, and something about the move was so endearingly spiky that Cesar had to stop himself from reaching out to trail his fingers across her jaw. Out of nowhere came a surge of something that felt almost like protectiveness.
His hands curled around the edge of his desk beside his hips. He forced his mind back to the conversation. ‘I have a charity auction to attend in Salamanca next weekend. We can go to that.’ The devil inside him compelled him to continue. ‘And we’ll have to be convincing, Lexie.’
Those big blue eyes narrowed. ‘Convincing?’
Cesar smiled, the anticipation inside him tightening now. ‘Convincing...as lovers.’
Lexie’s arms tightened, pushing those firm swells up even more. ‘Oh...well, yes. I mean, that’s obvious...but that’ll be easy enough... I mean...I’m an actress after all.’
Suddenly the confident woman of only a few moments ago was not at all sure of herself. Cesar was more intrigued than he liked to admit. He shifted on the desk, crossing one ankle over the other, and noted how Lexie’s eyes dropped to his mid-section for a second before skittering away again.
But then the suggestion that she’d have to act with Cesar hit home and made something hot and dark pierce him inside. He tensed. ‘So what happened earlier, Lexie? Were you just practising your acting skills on the nearest stable hand you could find?’
She looked at him. ‘No. It wasn’t like that.’
Cesar felt more exposed than he liked to. ‘So what was it like?’
For a second he fancied that the turmoil he could see in those blue depths mirrored the part of him that still couldn’t make sense of what had happened. But the very suggestion that it had been in any way within her control and not his made something snap inside him.
He straightened up and did what his hands had been itching to do ever since she’d walked into his study. He reached for her and pulled her into him, and something treacherous in his mind quietened as soon as those soft curves fell against him.
Her hands were pressed against his chest and a soft oof escaped her mouth: a sigh of shock. She looked up. ‘What are you doing?’
Cesar’s body was already hardening against hers. An automatic and helpless reaction to her proximity and touch. He hated this feeling of being out of control—it had been a long day of that very unwelcome sensation. He gritted out, ‘I’m seeing how good you are at improvisation.’
And then he bent his head to hers, and her mouth was as firm and yet as soft as he remembered, and those lush contours sent his brain into a tailspin all over again.
* * *
Lexie was drowning. Her hands looked for purchase anywhere she could find it to try and cling on. Cesar’s mouth was searing and hot. Hard. His arms were welded tight around her. She was off-balance and plastered against him, breasts crushed against rock-hard contours. One of his hands moved up to her head, angling it. Their mouths were open, tongues touching and tasting. Stroking, sucking.
Lexie wanted to wrap her arms around his neck and rub herself up and down his hard length, seeking to assuage the stinging in her nipples and the ache growing inside her. She could feel a hard ridge against her belly and it caused a spasm of damp desire between her legs.
And then the haze lifted ever so slightly, when he took his mouth away for a moment and she remembered his grim look and what he’d said, ‘I’m seeing how good you are at improvisation.’
As if a cold bucket of water had been thrown over her Lexie jerked backwards, almost stumbling in an effort to right herself. She was shaky all over, breathing heavily. Cesar was resting on the edge of the desk, barely a hair out of place, even if his cheeks were flushed and eyes were glittering brightly.
Lexie wasn’t ready for this onslaught of physical sensations and feelings. Barely able to get her head around articulating much, she asked, a little redundantly, ‘What was that in aid of?’
‘Proving that it will be no hardship to act out being lovers. In fact it’s almost inevitable that we will become lovers.’
Lexie rebelled at that arrogant tone even as her body betrayed her spectacularly. ‘Don’t flatter yourself, Mr Da Silva.’
He smiled. ‘It’s Cesar, please.’
Lexie felt dizzy at how quickly this man was dismantling the bricks and mortar that had protected her for years. She couldn’t analyse it now, but she knew that he must have connected with her on some very deep level for her to have allowed him to kiss her—not once, but twice. Without even putting up a fight.
Panic galvanised her and she reached down and picked up her bag, slung it over her shoulder. She forced herself to look at Cesar but it was hard. The air between them was saturated with electricity and tension and something else far more disturbing and new to Lexie: Desire.
She hated to admit that she was also stung to think that he believed she was the kind of person who would just widen her eyes and say yes to such an autocratic announcement.
She bit out, ‘I am not an easy lay, Cesar. Evidently you believe what you read in the papers, but I can assure you that I am perfectly capable of controlling myself. I am interested in putting forward a united front in order to get the press off our backs...that is all.’
Cesar stared at her for a long moment and then shrugged. He folded his arms across that wide chest, making the muscles of his arms bunch against the silk of his shirt.
‘We’ll see,’ he said carelessly. As if he truly didn’t care if she tumbled into his bed one way or the other. As if he knew that she would be helpless to resist him when the time came.
Curbing the urge to take her bag and swing it at his head, Lexie backed away to the door, her blood boiling—and not just from his words and that arrogance. She turned around and was reaching for the doorknob, relishing the prospect of removing herself from his orbit, when he called her name softly.
With the utmost reluctance Lexie gritted her jaw and turned around, keeping her hand on the door. He was still sitting there, eyes hooded, watching her.
‘Don’t forget...next weekend...Salamanca. That’s if you still want us to proceed with your suggestion.’
For a second Lexie contemplated the alternative and saw herself pacing up and down the dark castillo corridors or in the grounds. Trapped. With the press digging her life up again. Speculating. She went cold at that prospect. There was no choice.
She managed to say icily, ‘I won’t forget.’ And then she pulled the door open and left, with her dignity feeling badly battered.
CHAPTER THREE
WHEN LEXIE GOT to her room she paced. Full of pent-up energy. Hot and then cold at the same time when she reconsidered the equally disturbing prospects of appearing in public with Cesar and not. And the ramifications of the press’s interest in her if that was the case.
There was no doubt about it: appearing with Cesar would be the better scenario. It was only in the last few weeks that the tabloids’ interest in ‘Luscious Lexie the homewrecker’ had let up. If she was going to become press fodder again so soon, then she would not be the victim.
Cesar was unmarried. A bachelor. An affair with him would be old news very fast. And, she realised with some cynicism, it couldn’t hurt the film to be linked to this kind of publicity.
What she hadn’t counted on was the attraction she felt for Cesar. She’d just kissed him back again, as passionately as she had earlier, with no qualms. No hesitation! It was as if as soon as he touched her some ever-vigilant switch in her brain turned to off and she became mute. Acquiescent.
She held out her hands and noted that even now they were trembling slightly. Disgusted, she shoved them under her arms and then spied her electronic tablet. She marched over and opened it up.
She hated herself for it, but she found herself searching for Cesar Da Silva Girlfriend. Predictably not much came up except a few photos of him at events with beautiful women. They were all tall, brunette. Sleek. Classy. One was a UN diplomat. The next an attaché to a world leader. Another was a human rights lawyer.
There were also pictures of Cesar with world leaders at economic summits.
Lexie put a hand to her mouth to stem a slight surge of hysteria. She was seriously out of her depth with this man, and she didn’t like her feeling of insecurity when she was faced with the evidence of his previous lovers’ undoubted intellectual accomplishments. The plan for them to appear as lovers mocked her now. Who would ever believe he’d choose her?
Feeling like a stalker, she looked up his background. To her surprise, a new news article popped up. And a picture of him from earlier that very day, taken at a wedding in Paris. Lexie frowned for a second, wondering how he could have come from Paris back to the castillo in such a short space of time—and then she recalled hearing a helicopter earlier. Of course—to a man like Cesar Da Silva travel between European bases was far removed from most people’s more tedious, lengthy experiences.
She focused on the short piece again. It had been the wedding of Alexio Christakos and his very pretty bride—someone called Sidonie. The article seemed to be implying that a familial relationship existed between Alexio Christakos and Cesar Da Silva. And also another man: Rafaele Falcone.
Lexie frowned. She knew Christakos and Falcone were half-brothers. They’d been notoriously eligible bachelors before settling down. So...what? Cesar was related to these men? Lexie kept searching and found a very brief reference to his father. Joaquin Da Silva had been famously disinherited from his family after leaving to train as a bullfighter. He’d achieved some fame early on, before dying tragically in a goring by a bull.
There wasn’t much else apart from Cesar’s current accomplishments, of which there seemed to be many. He was listed as one of the world’s leading philanthropists.
The picture of Cesar at the wedding caught her eye again. She looked more closely. There was a definite resemblance between the two men. And Rafaele Falcone. She couldn’t be sure, but it looked as if they all shared varying shades of green eyes. Unusual. Too unusual.
A suspicion slid into place inside Lexie. He’d agreed so quickly to appearing in public with her, when all the evidence pointed to a man who would find that kind of exposure anathema. He wants me. Lexie shivered at the thought. Was he prepared to court the press’s attention just to get her into bed? That idea was both intoxicating and terrifying.
But perhaps Cesar had his own reasons for wanting to divert the press? If something was about to break about his family? She didn’t like it, but a feeling of empathy gripped her. And curiosity...
Just then a knock sounded on her door. Lexie’s heart jumped. She put the cover over her tablet’s screen and went to the door, steeling herself. But when she opened it, it was Tom—the producer. An acute dart of disappointment made her want to scowl.
She forced a smile. ‘Tom?’
He held up his own tablet to reveal the same picture of the kiss that Cesar had shown her just a short while before. Her insides tightened again at seeing herself in such an alien and lurid pose.
‘Ah...’ she said.
‘Ah...’ the older man echoed. ‘I didn’t realise you had history with Da Silva. You never mentioned anything...’
‘I don’t really want to discuss it, Tom, if that’s all right.’
‘Look,’ he said quickly, mollifying her, ‘I’m not complaining, Lexie—far from it. This is PR gold dust for the film. If you two are...together.’
Tom was obviously concerned that an affair between her and Cesar Da Silva might jeopardise filming if it wasn’t all that it seemed. He could throw them off his estate at any moment if he so wished.
Lexie’s jaw was tight. She imagined the press furore after they appeared in public next week. ‘Yes...’ she said reluctantly, as if not even wanting to give the words oxygen. ‘We are...together.’
The relief that crossed the producer’s face was almost comical. ‘Okay, that’s good. I mean, like I said, it’s gold dust for the film. We could never have generated this much press just by—’
‘Tom?’ Lexie cut him off, forcing another smile. ‘I’d appreciate an early night. I’ve a lot of prep to do this weekend before we start shooting on Monday.’
He backed away, putting a hand up. ‘Of course. I’ll leave you to it. Night, Lexie.’
When he was gone she sagged back against the door with relief. Out of the past, the words of her counsellor came back to her: ‘Lexie, one day you’ll meet someone and you’ll feel desire. And you’ll feel safe enough to explore it...and heal.’
Lexie stifled a semi-hysterical giggle. She’d felt it today, all right, but she didn’t feel safe right now. She felt in mortal danger. Especially when she thought of those distinctive green eyes and that hard-boned face...and that powerful body. That dark, brooding energy...
She felt anything but safe.
She thought again of Cesar’s nonchalant assertion that they would become lovers. A dart of anger gripped her insides. He was obviously used to women falling at his feet if he could make such a declaration. He had no idea of the scars that scored her insides like tattoos. Not visible to the naked eye, but she felt them every day. Scars she’d fought hard to overcome so she could function and live and work.
She resented Cesar Da Silva right then for inserting himself so solidly and irrevocably into her life. And yet she had no one to blame but herself.
Sighing volubly, Lexie pushed off the door and vowed to do whatever it took to focus on the most important thing in her life right now: the job she had to fulfil for the next four weeks. Her real acting job, as opposed to the acting she’d be doing in a week’s time. Although that filled her with a lot more trepidation because she was afraid that she wouldn’t have to act at all.
* * *
Midway through the following week Lexie was pacing back and forth on the set while they set up the cameras for a new shot. She was listening to the script on her mp3 player and repeating her lines to herself.
They were shooting not far from the castillo, in a walled garden. Inevitably, though, her thoughts deviated yet again to the person who had dominated almost every waking and sleeping moment since she’d met him, in spite of her best efforts.
He’d appeared to watch the filming at various intervals, effortlessly unsettling Lexie in the process. If he was around she became acutely self-conscious. And being dressed in cleavage-revealing nineteenth-century garb didn’t help.
Right then, just as she was sighing with relief that he hadn’t appeared today, he did appear—as if conjured up from her overheated imagination—striding towards her on the narrow path. She had nowhere to go. Trapped. All of the crew were busy working, oblivious to the seismic physical reaction inside Lexie as Cesar bore down on her in a secluded part of the garden.
Her heart sped up. She went hot all over. Pinpricks of sensation moved across her skin. Nipples tightened against her bodice. The corset became even more constrictive. She pulled the long coat she wore to keep warm more closely around her, to try and hide some of her far too buxom cleavage. She took the earphones out of her ears and fought the urge to take several steps back.
Cesar came to a stop in front of her. It didn’t help that he was dressed in much the same way as when she’d seen him for the first time, in a close-fitting polo shirt and jodhpurs. Hair mussed. Jaw stubbled. He’d obviously just been riding.
For a bizarre second Lexie actually couldn’t speak. His eyes were hypnotic. When he spoke, it jarred her out of the daze she was in.
‘I’ve arranged for my assistant to have some clothes delivered to you from a boutique in Salamanca.’
Lexie looked at him blankly. ‘Clothes?’
‘For the weekend...for future events.’
Suddenly Lexie realised what he meant, and immediately chafed at the implication that he had to buy clothes for her because she wasn’t as classy or elegant as his other lovers. And she hated that she’d thought that.
Stiffly she said, ‘You really don’t need to do that.’ Lexie knew she was out of his league; she didn’t need a reminder.
Cesar was obdurate. ‘Well, it’s too late. They’ve been delivered to your suite.’
Lexie opened her mouth again, but Cesar put up a hand.
‘If you don’t want to use them, that’s fine. See what’s there and decide. It’s no big deal.’
No, thought Lexie churlishly, because all it had taken was a mere snap of his fingers. She looked at him suspiciously. ‘How did you know what size I was?’ She immediately regretted asking the question when his gaze swept up and down her body. What he could see of it...
‘I asked the costume designer, just to be safe, but my own estimation wasn’t far off.’
Lexie burned with indignation and something much hotter to imagine Cesar guessing her vital statistics.
Just then a PA came close and hovered. When Lexie looked at her she made a signal that she was required. Lexie looked back at Cesar and said, with evident relief, ‘I have to go. They’re ready to shoot again.’
But he didn’t get out of the way. And Lexie knew she wasn’t supposed to step onto the manicured lawn.
She was about to open her mouth when he moved closer and put a hand around the back of her bare neck, exposed because her hair was up in a complicated chignon. He bent down and pressed a fleeting but hot kiss to her mouth, and then pulled back, letting her go.
Lexie tingled all over. Her head felt fuzzy. ‘What was that for?’
Cesar smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes, and Lexie felt something tug inside her, wondering again what he’d look like if he really smiled.
‘As you so memorably pointed out, there are camera phones around. I’m just being vigilant.’
Lexie flushed to recall what she’d said to him. There was nothing remotely fossil-like about this man. He was all bristling, virile energy.
Faintly she said, ‘Celeste will have to retouch my lipstick.’
He smirked. ‘Well, you’d better run along and let Celeste do that.’
For a second Lexie blinked at him. There was a tantalising glimmer of something lighter between them. But then he was turning and striding back the way he’d come, and as Lexie walked over to the main hub of the set she couldn’t be unaware of several appreciative female and male glances that lingered in his direction and then on her with undisguised envy.