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Both sides have always maintained a steely silence on events that led to this defection, but his dazzling performance today, coupled with reports that he is closely involved with Los Pumas, must make Calthorpe wonder if he would have been better swallowing his pride and keeping him on…
‘Utter rubbish,’ said Henry tartly as Tamsin folded the paper with exaggerated care and put it down on the seat between them.
Picking idly at a bead on the sleeve of her dress, Tamsin kept her voice neutral as she said, ‘You never liked him, though, did you?’
Henry suddenly seemed hugely interested in the featureless black landscape beyond the car window. ‘I didn’t trust him,’ he said with quiet bitterness. Then, turning back to Tamsin, he gave a bland smile. ‘He was dangerous. A loose cannon. No loyalty to the team with that…that God-awful tattoo on his chest. The press conveniently forget all that now, don’t they?’
Tamsin felt the breath catch painfully in her throat as the image of Alejandro’s chest, with the Argentine sun blazing on the hard plane of muscle over his heart, filled her head. As a teenager she had cut a picture from a magazine that had showed him stripped to the waist during one hot summer training session for the World Cup. Even now, all these years later, she could still recall the sensation of terrible, churning longing she’d felt whenever she looked at that tattoo.
The car slowed, and a scattering of flashbulbs from the other side of the darkened glass told her they’d arrived at the very exclusive hotel where the post-match party was being held. Tamsin blinked, dragging in a shaky breath and forcing herself back into the present as the car glided smoothly down the drive towards a solid-looking, square stone house half-covered with glossy creeper.
Even before the driver had opened the car door, the noise of the party was already clearly audible.
‘After this afternoon’s shameful performance, heaven knows what they think they’ve got to celebrate,’ said Henry cuttingly, getting out of the car. ‘You’d better do the photo-call straight away while there’s still some hope of the team doing justice to your elegant suits. If you leave it any later, they’ll all be rolling drunk and singing obscene songs. Come on.’
Henry held out his arm. Absently, she took it. ‘Oh, dear, you’re right. And, since the photographer wants all those cheesy and predictable shots of the team holding me up like a rugby ball, I’d rather I was in sober hands.’
Instantly she felt Henry bristle. He stopped, and Tamsin instantly cursed herself for walking right into that one. It was all Alejandro D’Arienzo’s fault. She wasn’t thinking clearly, otherwise she would have been all too aware that her father’s legendary and highly annoying protective streak was about to reveal itself. ‘That’s ridiculous,’ he snapped. ‘I’m not having my daughter mauled around by the entire team like some Playboy bunny. I’ll have a word with the photographer and make it perfectly clear that—’
‘No! Don’t you dare! I got this commission on my own merit, and I’ll handle the PR on my own terms.’
For a second they glared at each other in the light of the carriage lamps on either side of the front door. Then Henry withdrew his arm from hers and walked stiffly up the stone steps into the brightly lit reception hall, the set of his very straight back conveying his utter disapproval. Left alone outside, Tamsin gritted her teeth and stamped her foot.
Hell, he was impossible. It was all right for Serena; she’d always been able to wrap Henry round her little finger with a flash of her dimples and a flutter of her big blue eyes. Whereas Tamsin had always argued, and—
She paused.
Then, running quickly up the steps in her father’s wake, she caught up with him in the centre of the panelled reception area.
‘Please, Daddy.’ She caught hold of his arm, forcing him to stop.
Picturing Serena’s lovely face in her mind’s eye, and trying desperately to assume the same gentle, beseeching expression, Tamsin looked up at her father. ‘It’s only a couple of photographs,’ she said persuasively.
It worked like a charm. Instantly she saw the slight softening in Henry’s chilly grey gaze, and he nodded almost imperceptibly. ‘All right,’ he said gruffly. ‘You know best. I’ll let you get on with it.’
Relief flooded her, and impulsively she reached up to kiss his cheek. ‘Thank you, Daddy.’
Turning, she ran lightly across the hallway, just about managing to resist punching the air, but unable to stop a most un-Serenalike smile of elation breaking across her face.
Alejandro froze at the top of the stairs, his face as cold and impassive as the rows of portraits on the oak-panelled walls around him as he took in the touching little scene below.
He saw her cross the hallway in a ripple of silvery grey chiffon, her pale hair gleaming in the light from the chandelier above. He watched her tilt her face up to her father, looking up at him from under her dark lashes, and heard the persuasive, pleading tone in her husky voice as she spoke.
Please, Daddy… Thank you, Daddy… It was as much as he could do not to laugh out loud at the saccharine sweetness in her voice, but a second later his sardonic amusement evaporated as she turned away, and the melting look on her face gave way to a smile of pure triumph.
The calculating bitch.
Nothing had changed, he thought bitterly, carrying on down the corridor to his room. Not deep down, anyway. She’d cut her hair and gone blonde big style, but the glittering green eyes, the attitude and the rich-girl arrogance were still the same.
Back in his room he checked his watch and picked up the phone. It was just after five p.m. in Argentina, and the grooms would be turning the ponies out for the night. Two promising mares—a chestnut, and a pretty palomino that he’d bought last month in America for the new polo season—had been delivered yesterday and he was impatient to hear how they were settling in.
Giselle, his PA back at San Silvana, reassured him that the horses were doing fine. They’d recovered well from the journey, and the vet was happy that they would both be rested and ready to use on his return.
Alejandro felt better once he’d spoken to her. Nothing to do with the husky warmth in her voice, but simply because it was good to be reminded that San Silvana, with its rolling lawns, its stables, poolhouse and acres of lush paddock filled with ponies, was still there. Was real. Was his.
Coming back to England had dredged up insecurities he had long forgotten, he thought wryly, catching a glimpse of his reflection in the mirror as he went to the door. He’d come a long way, but beneath the bespoke dinner suit, the Savile Row shirt and silk bow-tie, there apparently still lurked the displaced boy who didn’t belong.
Out on the galleried landing the sounds of the party drifted up to him. Glancing down on his way to the stairs, he could see the England players, standing shoulder to shoulder in identical dark suits as they lined up for a photograph. They had their backs to him, and were standing in two rows while a photographer wearing tight leather-trousers and an expression of extreme harassment tried to get them all to stop messing around and keep still.
‘Fifty quid to swap places with Matt Fitzpatrick!’ someone called from the back row, and there was a huge guffaw of laughter, followed by someone else shouting, ‘A hundred!’
‘Sensible offers only, please, gentlemen,’ grinned Fitzpatrick.
For a second Alejandro didn’t understand the joke, but then he moved further along the shadowed gallery and looked down, feeling his sore shoulders stiffen and ice-cold disgust flood him.
Tamsin Calthorpe, her cheeks glowing and her honeyed hair shining like the sun beneath the photographer’s lights, was stretched out horizontally in the arms of the front row of players, facing out towards the camera. Matt Fitzpatrick, exuding Neanderthal pride, supported her body, one huge hand cupped around her left breast.
The photographer’s flash exploded as he took a volley of shots. Her bare legs and feet, held in the meaty hands of one of the England forwards, looked as delicate as the stem of some exotic flower, and next to the coarse, battered faces of the players Tamsin’s skin gleamed like pale-gold satin.
‘How come you get the best position anyway, Fitzpatrick?’ shouted one of the younger players at the back.
Tamsin laughed, and to Alejandro the sound was like fingernails on a blackboard. ‘He’s more experienced than you, Jones. And his handling skills are better.’ As Jones blushed to the roots of his hair, the team erupted into more rowdy laughter and cheers.
So that was what she’d been asking her father for: permission to appear in the team photo. He remembered her soft, pleading tone as she’d put her hand on his arm and said ‘only a couple of photographs’.
Had she no pride at all? Alejandro’s face felt stiff with contempt as he leaned against one of the gallery’s carved wooden posts and watched. What was she, some kind of unofficial team mascot? It was perfectly clear that she knew all the players pretty well.
How many had she slept with?
The thought slipped into his head without warning, but he had to brace himself against the lash of unexpected bitterness that accompanied it.
There was much clapping and shouting below as two of the players, under direction from the photographer, lifted her onto their shoulders. Laughing, Tamsin tipped back her head and looked up.
He watched the smile die on her glossy lips as her eyes met his.
In that moment Alejandro realised who it was she reminded him of: the blondes who’d populated the rugby parties he used to attend. The girl he’d thought was so different had grown up into one of those women he’d so despised at the party at Harcourt. A polished, hard-society blonde whose satiny skin concealed a ruthless streak a mile wide. A professional flirt, a consummate party girl, a shallow, manipulative man-user whose every flattering word was meaningless and every smile was a lie.
And, judging from the look on her face now, she was all too aware she’d been found out.
No.
No, no no.
It couldn’t be possible. Even her luck wasn’t that bad. As the two props set her back on her feet, Tamsin shook her fringe from her eyes and looked back up into the minstrels’ gallery where a figure in the shadows had caught her eye. A figure she’d thought for one nasty moment was…
Oh, God. It was. Him.
He was leaning insolently against a carved wooden post, looking down. Though his face was in shadow, every line of his elegant, powerful body seemed to communicate contemptuous amusement, and she could feel his eyes searing her with their intensity and their disdain.
The photographer clapped his hands and trilled, ‘OK, people—are we ready? Now, if the two guys on either side of Miss Calthorpe could look down at her, please?’
Why? Why couldn’t he just go?
Dimly Tamsin was aware of laughing banter breaking out around her again, and of Matt pulling her towards him and making some joking comment to the player on her other side. But, as she looked up into Matt’s appreciative blue eyes, it was Alejandro’s cold, contemptuous stare that she saw.
The photographer’s flash exploded in her face as fury erupted inside her.
That was what he’d done to her that night.
‘That’s fabulous,’ gushed the photographer. ‘Really fabulous. Gorgeous, sexy pout, Miss Calthorpe. Now, shoulders straighter, Matt… Lovely.’
He’d broken something inside her, so that no matter how much men like Matt flattered her and flirted with her…
‘Tamsin, you’re looking delicious. Just put your hand on Matt’s chest…yes, like that…’
…she could never quite make herself believe that they meant it.
‘Now, let’s make sure we get the nice rose-patterned lining of the jacket in the shot. Just slip your hand underneath his jacket, and sort of half-push it off his shoulder. Yeah, like that. That’s gorgeous.’
Maybe it was time she proved to Alejandro Arrogant D’Arienzo, and herself, that not all men found her such a turn-off?
The shutter rattled like machine-gun fire. High on adrenalin, fuelled by fury, Tamsin let instinct take over. For six years she had surrounded herself with a forest of thorns, keeping men at bay with her endless succession of barbed comments and razor- sharp retorts, all because he had robbed her of the belief that she was desirable. But she would show him that she was attractive, she was sexy… Her spine arched reflexively as she slid her hand over Matt’s shoulder, but it wasn’t Matt she was thinking of. Turning her head towards the bright lights and the camera, lifting her chin in silent, brazen challenge, she looked into the shadows, straight into Alejandro’s eyes.
It was like a steel trap closing around her—cold, hard, unyielding. He was looking down at her, the lights from below accentuating the sharp planes of his face, which were wholly at odds with the sensual swell of his mouth. And then, as she watched, he shook his head in an attitude of incredulous, pitying amusement.
He turned and walked away. Just as he had six years ago. He walked away, without a backwards glance, leaving the hot throb of desire ebbing from her and nothing but icy desolation and humiliation in its place.
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