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Like he’d once done.
His gaze snapped to her face. “Those would be my plans to sell off a few of Layton’s less lucrative holdings.”
She took a step toward the pool. “The New York location? New York? Are you crazy?”
“Not at all. That hotel is small, outdated. It costs more in upkeep each year than it makes in profit.”
The papers crinkled in her fist. “Why do you hate me so much?” she said, in a smaller voice than he would have expected.
She seemed almost bewildered. But it was a ploy. She would use anything to distract him, including sex. How well he knew that about her.
Her poor little me act angered him. “You know why. You used me to get information. You slept with me, then stole what you learned about the London deal to grab it for yourself. That move nearly destroyed Ramirez Enterprises.”
Ramirez Enterprises had been little more than bravado and a dream back then. But losing the Cahill Group’s financing had destroyed far more precious things than his fledgling enterprise. He wasn’t about to tell her what she’d really cost him—what she’d forced him into to save everything.
She tilted her head to one side. “I didn’t…”
“Didn’t what?” he said, when she stopped speaking and stood there gazing off into space.
“You’re lying.” She crossed her arms and glared down at him. “You couldn’t possibly be wiped out by one deal gone bad.”
Of course she didn’t realize how he’d struggled. She’d never struggled for anything a day in her life. From her first moments everything had been handed to her on a silver platter. He very much enjoyed being the one to take it all away.
Alejandro pressed his hands on the pool deck and levered himself out of the water. She took a step backward as he suddenly towered over her. He wanted to grab her, wanted to yank her into his arms and plunder her sweet mouth again. He turned away before his body betrayed his reaction to her. “Things were less certain then.”
“So you bought a controlling interest in my company and now you plan to sell off my hotels one by one?”
Grabbing a towel from the lounge chair, he wiped his face dry before giving her a dangerous smile. “Only the unprofitable ones, querida.”
“La Belle Amelie was the first hotel my father opened after he married,” she said. “He named it for my mother.”
Alejandro finished drying off and tossed the towel aside. She looked at him like he’d kicked her puppy. He hated it, hated the way she made him feel. But she was oh so good at manipulating him, wasn’t she?
Never again.
“It goes.”
Her laugh was bitter. “To think I once believed—” She shook her head, inched her chin higher. Met his gaze firmly. “I’ll buy it from you. Give me a couple of weeks to put together the financing and I’ll—”
“You once believed what?”
“Make you a good offer.”
“Believed what, Rebecca?”
“Did you hear what I said? I want to buy La Belle Amelie. What I believed is of no consequence.”
“Did you think I would marry you after a month together? Is that why you left?”
“God, no!”
She took another step back and he realized he’d been stalking her. He moved casually toward the edge of the pool, gave her space. The restless energy in him still demanded release, pounded through his body in waves. The hum was almost sexual, primal. Not much different from the way he’d felt whenever he’d faced a bull in the ring. He wanted to conquer, subdue, triumph.
“I left because you were engaged, Alejandro.” Her chin fell as she studied the tiles at her feet. “I thought you were an honorable man. That’s what I once believed.”
If he’d been gored by a bull he’d have felt less pain. Less anger.
The unbelievable nerve of this woman.
“You dare to question my honor when it was you who left—you who went to London and talked the Cahill Group into backing you instead of me? I spent months putting that deal together and you yanked the rug from under me. No, I will never sell La Belle Amelie to you!”
Alejandro dragged in a breath, willed calm to replace the seething fury roiling inside him. “I’ll have it demolished first, Rebecca. You can pick through the rubble and see what you can salvage then.”
She remained unnaturally silent, her slender form shaking. He’d expected fury. Tears maybe. Pleading if she thought it would work. Sex as a last resort.
But the last thing he ever expected was for her to tackle him.
CHAPTER TWO
EVERYTHING went wrong the instant Rebecca lunged. Fury ate at her gut like battery acid. She’d planned to shove his arrogant carcass into the pool and go back to her room. And then she was going to call financier Roger Cahill. What Alejandro accused her of couldn’t possibly be true.
Except the momentum required to throw Alejandro off balance tipped her too far forward. Her arms windmilled like crazy before she lost the fight and splashed down, landing on fifteen stone worth of angry Spanish male.
Something collided hard with the top of her head, and then she was sinking beneath the surface. She sucked in a breath, gulped chlorine. She needed to fight her way back up, needed to kick hard and breach the liquid barrier above her. But she couldn’t seem to do it. Her limbs wouldn’t cooperate.
How ironic to die in Alejandro’s pool. The last thought rattling through her brain was that if there were any justice in the world, he’d get blamed for her death.
A second later, air burst into her lungs. She coughed sharply, spitting up water. Her head lolled against something hard and warm.
Alejandro.
“Querida, speak to me,” he urged in a harsh voice.
Her back pressed down on a hard surface and she realized he’d laid her on the tile beside the pool. A moment later he hovered over her, his hands bracketing her head, water dripping from his skin onto hers.
She coughed again, her throat raw and burning. A sob welled up from somewhere inside, but she refused to give in to it. She gulped it back and stuffed it down deep. The last thing she would ever do was show weakness in front of this man.
“Rebecca, amor, say something. Call me a name if it pleases you.”
“Arrogant idiot,” she sputtered, though it came out as little more than a whisper. “Foolish Spaniard.”
He grinned down at her. “I said one name, did I not?”
Her heart lurched. Not a good thing. “It makes me happy, calling you names.”
It also made her happy to see him smile at her, but that was a piece of information she had no intention of sharing. One tear slipped from the corner of her eye and blazed a hot trail down her temple. She’d only been here a few hours and already a part of her longed for what used to be. Get over it, Becca. He’s not the right man for you, never was. He used you, same as Parker Gaines did.
“What happened?” she asked, dashing the tear away with her fingers.
“I was trying to move out of the way when you fell on top of me. Your head connected with my elbow.”
“Oh.”
His fingers spanned her skull, probing softly. He was so close his breath whispered over her skin, sent a shiver skimming. “No bumps. I think you will live.”
“Sell me the hotel, Alejandro,” she urged, her eyes searching his. “It means nothing to you.”
“And everything to you.”
“Yes.” She pulled a deep breath into her lungs, savoring the sweet night air, forcing herself to go on though her throat was raw. “They built it together. He knew she missed Paris, and he gave it a French theme. There are family antiques in the hotel even now.”
“You may have them.” His eyes were flat, the concession seeming to cost him a great deal to say. “I won’t prevent you from taking what is sentimental to you.”
“The hotel is sentimental to me. I—” she swallowed “—I was born there. I beg you to reconsider.”
His gaze slid down her body, over the wet dress clinging to every curve. One dark hand settled on her thigh, traced the outline of her leg, moving slowly up to her hip. His touch burned her, even through the layer of wet material between them. Mercy, what those fingers had done to her the last time they’d been together.
Rebecca bit her lip.
“To what lengths are you willing to go, bella, to secure your hotel?” His look was intense, as if a word or a nod from her would set in motion a seismic event that could not be stopped until they sprawled together in bed sated, replete—utterly ruined.
Her heart tapped hard inside her chest. His head descended in slow motion to her throat, his tongue pressing against an erratic pulse-point. “You want this,” he murmured. His fingers spread over the wet material on her thigh. Her skin was cold from the pool and the night air, but his hand sizzled where it touched, branding her.
Once she would have welcomed his touch. Would have opened herself to him and reveled in the way he made her feel. Part of her still wanted to.
But she couldn’t. It would cost her too much.
“No,” she said softly. And again, stronger, “No.”
His head lifted. His eyes searched hers, almost as if he couldn’t believe what she’d said. Oddly, it gave her courage. She pushed him away, satisfied when he rocked back, breaking all contact between them.
She lifted herself onto her elbows, and then to a sitting position when her head no longer spun. “I will buy it from you, Alejandro. I won’t sleep with you for it.”
“My, how you’ve changed.” Sarcasm thickened his voice. “You weren’t so principled five years ago.”
“It’s funny that you talk about principles when you were the one with a secret fiancée. Or was I the secret mistress?”
He unfolded from the tile deck, rose to his full height. “The only secrets were the ones you kept while you lied to me about your true reasons for being at the Villa de Musica.”
Rebecca shook her head softly, stopped when a wave of nausea threatened. “You’re unbelievable, Alejandro. You say I lied to you and stole your deal, but you were the one using me to learn how to expand your reach beyond Spain—”
“What?” He looked incredulous, his voice snapping into the night like a whip.
Rebecca shoved herself to her feet. The movement was too quick, and she almost sank to the ground, but Alejandro reached out and steadied her.
“I’m fine,” she said, shrugging away from his touch. “We talked all the time, Alejandro. You asked me about every detail of the business, and I told you all I knew. You used me.”
His hand dropped away. “I did not need you to succeed, Rebecca,” he said coldly. “That I now own Layton International is proof of that, do you not think?”
She wrapped her arms around her wet body, her teeth beginning to chatter though she was burning up with fury on the inside. No, he hadn’t needed her at all. Not in the way she’d wanted anyway. “You got lucky.”
“Lucky? I make my own luck, querida. I don’t wait for chance.”
One temple throbbed with the beginnings of a headache. He’d gotten lucky because her father had made mistakes, taken risks. If making his own luck meant watching Layton International like a panther and pouncing when they were crippled beneath the weight of obligations, then fine. He hadn’t left anything to chance.
The exhaustion of the day sat like a lead weight on her shoulders. She just wanted to go to her room and pretend she was anywhere but here. With her ex-lover. Her ex-love.
“If you give me a few days, I’ll put together a fair offer for La Belle Amelie.”
He snapped his towel from the chaise, where he’d dropped it the first time. “You may have the family antiques, Rebecca, but the hotel is not negotiable.”
“You just offered to let me buy it if I’d sleep with you.”
He laughed. “No, I asked to what lengths you would go for the hotel. I did not say I would accept the offer.”
Rebecca grabbed the papers she’d tossed onto one of the chaises. Then she spun to face him again, the documents crumpling in her chilled fist. “You can’t deny you were aroused, Alejandro. If I’d said yes, we’d be in bed right now.”
He looked bored. “I’m a man. A woman pressed against my body causes a reaction, sí. This is true of many men, I believe.”
“Some more than others, apparently. I should have believed the stories I read about you. When you weren’t fighting bulls you were bedding every woman in sight. I could have saved myself a lot of trouble.”
The look he gave her was sharp. “The press enjoys telling tales. If I’d bedded half the women they accused me of, I’d have been too tired to fight and the bulls would have won.”
“Well, it certainly didn’t stop you from sleeping with me and a fiancée at the same time. Were there others too?” She flung the words at him, surprised at the vehemence knotting her throat. For years she’d thought of the face-to-face confrontation they’d never had. Would he have denied it if she’d given him the chance? Would he have apologized? He’d tried to convince her over the phone that he was not engaged. But his denials had fallen short because the truth was irrefutable.
“There was no one but you.”
“You were engaged,” she said, forcing the words past the wedge of pain in her throat. “I think that counts as someone else.”
“I was not engaged.”
“But you married her anyway. How convenient.”
He took a step toward her, menace rolling from him in waves. “I married her because of you—because you stole from me and left me no choice.”
This time she stood her ground. “I didn’t steal anything, Alejandro. That’s a lie.”
“Of course you would say that. But it does not change the truth. When the Cahill Group informed me of their decision, they said they were investing in Layton International instead. Do you intend to tell me Roger Cahill lied?”
Rebecca tried to remember exactly what had happened then. She’d left Spain and gone to London to meet with Roger, at her father’s direction, about a financing deal. They had not discussed Ramirez Enterprises. She would have remembered since the pain of Alejandro’s betrayal had still been so raw.
“We were working with Roger on a South American deal. What he and his investors decided about you had nothing to do with us.”
Alejandro snorted. “You expect me to believe that? Layton International wanted to shut out the competition. You tried to ruin me, or at least contain me to Spain.”
“No,” she said softly. “There was no reason. You weren’t important enough.”
He stiffened as if she’d dealt him a body-blow. “Or good enough, sí?”
“That’s not what I meant.” Ramirez Enterprises hadn’t been big enough to be a threat, but he didn’t give her a chance to explain.
“I know what you meant, querida. How difficult it must have been for you to endure my touch. To sacrifice your body for the sake of your precious Layton International.” He stalked closer until he towered over her—so close she could feel the heat of his skin, could smell the mixture of chlorine and male that threatened to overwhelm her senses. “You did a fine job of playing the whore, Rebecca. You were quite natural at it. But do not worry that you will ever need to lie beneath this dirty torero again. There are plenty of women who find it no chore to do so.”
His words stung. “I slept with you because I wanted to. No other reason.”
“Yes, tell yourself that if it makes you feel better.”
Rebecca took a step away from him, her belly churning with hurt and anger. How dare he question her feelings, her integrity. He suggested she’d thought he was beneath her, unworthy of her because of what he’d been. God, it was untenable! “I loved you, Alejandro,” she whispered fiercely. “You—”
“Silencio! I will not listen to your lies.” He wrapped the towel around his waist and stood with fists on lean hips. Moonlight limned the hard contours of his chest, glistened on the water that still dripped from his head and left a trail of silver down his skin.
“Nothing you say will change the past, Rebecca, nor the fact I own Layton International. Spend your time worrying about your job, and cease trying to convince me you ever cared for me. We both know the truth.”
* * *
Señora Flores coolly informed Rebecca that breakfast was usually served on the terrace in summer. There would be no coffee or pastries delivered to her room, no matter how sweetly she asked. But the last thing she thought she could do right now was sit across from Alejandro and share a meal. In fact, if she managed to avoid him altogether that would make her day nearly perfect. He’d accused her of so much ugliness. Of sleeping with him for information, of stealing from him and of lying about being in love with him.
Oddly, it was the last thing that bothered her most. She’d been so naive. She’d fallen fast and hard, and then she’d let the words fall from her lips often and easily. And, though he’d never repeated them, she’d believed he had cared for her. Believed what they had was special.
Until his fiancée sent a wedding coordinator to his hotel suite. A wedding coordinator. The woman had invitation samples, possible menus and fabric samples for his tuxedo. And he’d still denied he was engaged.
She was the one who’d been wronged, damn him! The one who’d had her heart broken and the pieces pulverized beneath his boot heels. Previous experience should have taught her he was only using her for the information she could give him, for her status as Jackson Layton’s daughter, but she’d denied the truth and carried on blissfully with the affair. And he accused her of betraying him? Was the man insane?
She’d wanted to call Roger Cahill last night, see if she could find out what really happened, but it had been too late when she’d returned to her room. Today, however, she would make that call. There must have been a reason the Cahill Group had pulled their backing. A reason that had nothing to do with her or Layton International. Alejandro might never believe it, but at least she would know the truth.
Until then, how could she go out on that terrace and face him like nothing had ever happened between them? Eating with him was too intimate, too much like the past. And after last night her nerves were scraped raw.
She briefly considered refusing to join him, but she was too hungry—and she definitely needed the caffeine. Rebecca ran a comb through her honeyed curls one last time, before twisting them into a knot and securing it with a clip. Then she smoothed a stray wrinkle from her cream pantsuit and grabbed her briefcase, before shoving on a pair of matching sunglasses and heading for the terrace. She didn’t want Alejandro to see the dark circles beneath her eyes. He’d only gloat at her distress, and she was in no mood for it.
She passed through a large great room, with soaring ceilings and pale stucco walls. Dark Spanish timbers spanned the ceiling at regular intervals. Cool cream furniture and inlaid Syrian wood tables clustered on silk Oriental carpets near a giant fireplace. Priceless art graced the walls—a Bellini madonna, a Picasso etching and a Velázquez oil among them. Even at his best, her father could only have afforded one or two of those paintings. Alejandro must be very rich indeed to have such a collection.
She went through large double doors propped open onto the terrace. Alejandro sat in profile to her. His white shirt hung open casually, the paleness of the fabric in contrast to his sun-warmed skin. A gray suit jacket was draped across a chair, the expensive fabric gleaming richly in the dappled sunlight falling through the arbor. He spoke a rapid stream of Castilian into the phone wedged to his ear. He didn’t look up as she approached.
A uniformed man held out a chair. Rebecca gave him a smile as she sank onto it.
“Coffee, señorita?”
“Please.”
He poured a steaming cup for her while she helped herself to a slice of toast, spread it with jam and took a bite. She could eat a side of beef, she was so hungry, but the typical Spanish breakfast was toast and jam, or churros with a pot of chocolate. After polishing off the first slice, she fixed another, biting into it as she let her gaze roam the courtyard.
“You wish for eggs and bacon?”
The sudden English startled her, whipped her concentration from the hot-pink bougainvillea vines overflowing the arbor. Alejandro’s attention was on her now, the phone resting on the table beside his plate.
“This is fine.”
“You do not want something more American?”
“Toast is American.” She avoided meeting his eyes.
Alejandro shrugged. “It is not a problem. If you wish for something more, you have only to say so.”
She continued to eat her toast. In light of all they’d said to each other last night, she didn’t want to be thankful to him for anything. Knowing she owed him for dragging her out of the pool before she drowned was bad enough. Though if he hadn’t made her so angry she wouldn’t have been in the pool in the first place.
“You slept well?”
“Well enough,” she said, spreading a third slice with jam. Praying he wouldn’t guess she’d done anything but. That her heart was doing double time and her nerve-endings sizzled simply from being near him.
Before she knew what he was doing, he was standing beside her. He removed the clip holding her hair back and dropped it on the table as he tunneled his fingers into the loosened strands.
“Alejandro—”
“Shh.” His touch was gentle, sure—and as startling as ever. He was so close his scent invaded her senses. No chlorine this time. Just expensive soap and man. Her eyes drifted closed as warmth spread through her.
“Ouch!” Her eyes snapped open again.
“It’s a small bump,” he said, his fingers exploring the swelling on her head. “Nothing serious.”
Rebecca marshaled her resolve as awareness followed hard on the heels of the warmth permeating her body. “Stop touching me,” she said, batting at his hand.
“I have experience of these things, bella. You wouldn’t want it to be serious, would you?”
“It’s not. Leave me alone.”
A second later, he whipped off her sunglasses. She tried to pull away, but he gripped her chin firmly, his eyes searching hers. “You did not sleep well.”
Rebecca managed to jerk away. She snatched the shades from his hand and replaced them, praying he wouldn’t see how she suddenly trembled with his nearness. How her skin sizzled and her blood hummed from the contact. “No thanks to you.”
He returned to his chair and picked up his coffee cup. “It was you who pushed me into the pool, not the other way around.”
“I wasn’t talking about the pool. I’m talking about jet lag. I was in Hawaii yesterday, New York the day before. You could have given me more time to get here.”
Hardly the full truth of why she hadn’t been able to sleep, but that was all he was getting out of her.
He shrugged. “It’s business. I do not have time to wait while you make your way leisurely around the world.”
“No, I imagine stealing works best when done quickly.”
His eyes glittered. “Careful, Rebecca.”
“Or what? You’ll drown me in your pool?” She knew she went too far, but she couldn’t help it. Her bitterness from his accusations of last night boiled beneath the surface.
He set the cup down and stood, tossing his napkin onto the table. “We leave for the office in ten minutes. Be in the car if you wish to salvage anything of Layton International.”
“Is that even possible? Or do you plan to sell it off piece by piece just to hurt me?”
He grabbed his jacket from the chair. “You will have to wait and find out. There is no other option, sí?”
Rebecca set the toast down, no longer hungry. “You really like being the one in control. You’re enjoying this very much, aren’t you?”
Alejandro’s smile sent a chill skimming down her spine. “You have no idea, Señorita Layton.”