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Was this what it felt like to every woman, to be a rich man’s mistress?
Or was it just because the man was Rafael, and she blossomed beneath the miracle of his full, devoted attention?
Whatever the reason, Louisa had never felt so beautiful or so desired. She’d never felt so happy. She felt like a different woman. Everyone here treated her as if she were some gorgeous young creature who deserved to be spoiled, her every whim catered to. They treated her as if luxury and admiration were her birthright, and they did it in such a convincing way that she almost was starting to believe it herself. Especially when Rafael kissed her like this…
He pulled away abruptly. His gray eyes were the color of slate, dark with need.
“You look beautiful in this bikini,” he growled. “You’d look even better without it.”
She looked up at him. Bright sunlight traced the sharp edges of his cheekbones and jawline with shadow. He was so impossibly handsome. So impossible to resist. And here, in this fantastic place, she had no reason to resist him. She wasn’t a housekeeper here.
She was Rafael’s mistress.
“I’m glad you like the bikini, since you’re the one who insisted on buying it—along with the other four.” She gave a sudden laugh. “Honestly, Rafael, how many swimsuits do you think a girl needs for a two-day vacation?”
He put his hand on the naked skin between her breasts, barely covered with small triangles of fabric. “If you’re the girl, I’d prefer none.”
He slowly undid the tie of her bikini. Pulling it off her body, he dropped the top to the floor.
She tried to cover herself with her hands. “The staff,” she whispered.
He stopped her, pulling her hands away.
“They will see nothing,” he said between kisses. “They are paid not to see.”
He cupped her breasts, then suckled each nipple beneath the bright Greek sun. Slowly he licked his way down her belly before he lazily untied the strings of her bikini bottom. The reflection of the sunlight from the pool dazzled her, causing sparkles like diamonds in her vision. Or maybe it was just the way Rafael touched her…
She closed her eyes. She felt him stroking her, as if she were a precious treasure. His desired, adored mistress. He kissed and licked down the length of her tanned belly, his skin now warm against hers. She heard him move, heard his swim trunks fall to the floor, and then he was on top of her…
For just a moment. Her world turned upside down and she opened her eyes in surprise, realizing that he was now beneath her on the lounge chair, and he’d placed her astride him. His hard erection was jutting between her naked legs.
Rafael met her eyes steadily.
She took a deep breath. Then, with some trepidation, she touched him, stroking his shaft gently. He moved beneath her fingers, expanding somehow to even greater size in her hand until she wondered how it was possible he would ever fit again inside her.
“Kiss me,” he commanded. She wondered for an instant exactly where he meant her to kiss him, then she felt him drag her shoulders up so he could plunder her mouth with his own. Below, she felt his hardness move against her soft belly, then between her legs, seeking entrance. He kissed her deeply, entwining his tongue with her own, and she involuntarily swayed her hips against him. She felt him jump beneath her, rock hard and huge. Her breasts felt heavy against his dark-haired chest, her nipples tightening to painful intensity as she swayed. The hot Greek sun beat into the naked skin of her back, against the warmth of his smooth skin.
She ached for him. Ached. But he wouldn’t take her. Though she could see how greatly he desired her, he seemed to be waiting, to be taunting her and luring her to be the one to initiate. He wanted her to be the one to take him.
With an intake of breath, she lowered herself over him, taking him a single inch inside her.
She heard him gasp—or had the sound come from her own lips?
She moved and swayed against him, wrapping tighter and lower in a circular motion, moving the tight molten core of her liquid need against his taut muscular body. With each circle, she moved lower, bringing his shaft deeper and deeper still inside her. She felt him tremble and gasp with his own need but he did not try to force the rhythm or roll her beneath him. He let her control the pace, and when she looked into his face, she could see what that cost him, how close and grimly he was hanging to the ragged edge of his desire.
She finally took him all the way inside her, all the way to the hilt, and for a moment she could not move. She closed her eyes, savoring the feel of him inside her, wishing she could make the moment last forever.
Then she heard the hoarse gasp of his breath and knew how she was torturing him. She smiled. She moved against him, riding him slow and deep, and the first shuddering wave almost immediately hit her. She gripped his shoulders and held on for dear life as her hips rode him harder and faster. She felt him shudder and shake and he cried out her name. Hearing his name on her lips, her own world exploded, blinding her with a million shards of light and darkness, of white sun and blue sea.
She exhaled.
When she came back to herself, she was lying on top of him. In wonder and amazement, she stared down at her pale hand splayed across his dark-haired chest. Though she’d been sunning herself all day, her skin was still pale and fair compared to his darkly tanned olive hue. Both his strong arms were still wrapped possessively around her body, holding her against him. Rafael’s eyes were closed as he slept, a smile of amazed joy still tracing his sensual mouth.
She loved him.
Staring at him, she could not deny it. Deny it? She gloried in it.
She loved him.
Then as she stared at his beautiful face, her smile faded.
She still hadn’t taken the test.
With an intake of breath, she lowered her head back against his bare chest, closing her eyes. She hadn’t had a single moment alone, and there wasn’t exactly a twenty-four-hour drugstore on this island. There was nothing here except the sprawling mansion…and tennis courts…and two pools…and stables…and a vineyard. This entire island was nothing but a rich man’s fantasy.
Tomorrow, they would return to Istanbul. She would cease being Rafael’s cosseted mistress, and return to being his plain, efficient housekeeper. She would serve the guests at his dinner party, then begin preparations to assist the real estate agent in the sale of the house Louisa had created with such love. That she’d created for him.
With her cheek pressed against the rough dark hair of his muscular chest, she stared out blindly at the shimmering blue sea beneath the swimming pool. She’d just started to feel at home in Istanbul. But now, just like Paris—just like Miami—the rug was being pulled out from beneath her.
When would she finally have a home of her own, a home no one could ever take from her?
Louisa blinked fast, staring out at the bright blue sea blending into eternity with the endless blue sky. Memories raced through her, memories she’d tried to avoid for five years. Memories of Matthias…and Katie. I’m sorry, Louisa. I never meant to get pregnant.
Would she ever have enough distance in space and time that her past would no longer haunt her?
She felt Rafael’s hand brush against her cheek. She looked up at him.
“What is it, Louisa?” he said softly. His gray eyes seared her, searching her soul. “What are you thinking about?”
With an intake of breath, she looked away. She hadn’t told him about her past. She hadn’t spoken of it to anyone.
Five years ago, she’d been stabbed to the heart by the two people she loved most in the world. She’d fled the United States for a fresh start. She’d changed her bright, formfitting clothes to plain, serviceable gray ones, boxy, shapeless suits. She’d lost her appetite. She’d lost weight. She’d started wearing glasses instead of contacts and pulled her brown hair back in a tight bun. She’d done everything she could do to make sure no man would ever notice her again.
She found a new job in Paris. She hadn’t feared to work for Rafael. She knew she would be safe from any playboy’s charms. She’d worked constantly, literally lived at her workplace, and hadn’t taken a vacation—not so much as a single Saturday off.
She’d tried not to love Rafael. She’d tried. But somehow, he’d snuck past all her defenses…
Rafael’s hand stroked her cheek. “You won’t answer. You never answer,” he said softly. “Someday you will.” He looked down at her. “Someday, you will tell me everything.”
But as he pulled her once more into his arms beneath the bright Greek sun, Louisa knew she would never tell him about the last man she’d fallen in love with. Her last boss. At least, she’d thought it was love at the time. She’d been so young then, so young and naive…
Thinking of the pain in her past, she looked at her future and was very, very afraid.
“Do you like this place?” he said softly, twisting a tendril of her hair around his finger.
She looked at him.
“So much that maybe I should get a job here,” she said, only half-joking. “Does your friend who owns this island need a housekeeper? What is his name?”
Rafael glowered at her. Irritation emanated off him in waves.
“He is not a kind man. Especially where women are concerned.”
She’d been trying to lighten the mood, but it seemed to have failed miserably. Why was he taking her comment so seriously? Lifting herself on one elbow, Louisa reached up to rub his shoulder. “The same could be said about you,” she teased.
His jaw clenched. “Yes,” he said shortly. “It could.”
Was it possible he was jealous? No, surely not! “You know I’m not serious, Rafael!”
“I do not care for such jokes of you mentioning other men,” he said stiffly. “You belong to me.”
She stopped rubbing his shoulder. She looked at him. “I belong to you?”
He shook his head. “You know what I meant. You are a valued member of my staff. You—”
“No,” she interrupted. She pulled back her hand, sitting up. Suddenly she was so furious she couldn’t think straight. “You had it right the first time. You think I belong to you. That you own me. That I’m your possession.” So much for imagining herself to be his adored mistress! “You think I have no feelings.” She slapped down on the nearby table. “Like this!”
“Do not be dramatic. I pay you well. There is no question of you being my possession. You stay in my employ because you appreciate your situation.”
“And now?” She looked around them at the luxurious place that had suddenly lost its glamour. “Am I working for you now?”
He ground his teeth. “No. You know you are not!”
“Then who am I to you?”
“Here, you are my mistress. Beyond this island, you are the best servant on my staff. You oversee all of my homes, coordinating with the other housekeepers. I could not manage without you.”
He might as well have slapped her across the face.
“Perhaps it really is time for me to move on,” she said slowly, feeling numb. Why did she feel so betrayed, when she’d known all along how this would end?
“No,” he said furiously. “You won’t go work for him—or any other man. You belong to—with,” he corrected himself as he caught her glare, “me.”
His hands grasped her naked waist in the bright sunlight. She looked down into his gray eyes. His face was dark, almost savage. She could hear the hoarseness of his breath. Their eyes locked.
His fingers tightened on her almost painfully.
Then he reached up and kissed her.
His kiss was hard and deep, a plundering of her mouth, as if he’d held something back for far too long, as if the master had himself been enslaved by an unwilling passion he could no longer control. His kiss abruptly became more persuasive, wistful and sensual in a way she could not resist. She wrapped her arms around his neck as, with a low growl, he pulled her back against his naked body on the lounge chair. She could feel how he already wanted her again.
“You belong to me,” he whispered. “Say it.”
“Never,” she said.
But her defiance only seemed to increase the force of his passion. He made love to her again beneath the hot Greek sun, hard and fast and with a brutality that matched her own passionate desire.
“You’re the only woman I trust,” he said in a low voice afterward, caressing her cheek as he looked down at her cradled in his arms. “The only woman I’ve trusted in a long, long time.”
But as he held her and closed his eyes, dozing in the sun, tears streaked unheeded down Louisa’s sunburned cheeks.
She was well and truly caught.
She had to face it. Though she knew it was nothing more than a fantasy, though she knew it was foolish, stupid and dangerous, she could no more stop loving him than stop breathing. No two-day idyll would cure her of loving Rafael.
She did belong to him. Completely.
Chapter Four
BACK in Istanbul the next afternoon, Louisa stumbled as she came out of the private hospital northeast of Taksim Square. Blindly she stepped into the street.
A loud honk made her fall back as she was nearly run over by a taxi driver who shouted at her in fluent, expressive Turkish. Gasping, almost crying, Louisa stood trembling on the sidewalk, shivering with shock.
Pregnant.
She was pregnant with Rafael’s baby. Pregnant with the child she’d promised him she could never conceive!
Over the last week, she’d tried to mock her own fears, tried to convince herself she was being foolish to worry. But she hadn’t been foolish at all. The doctor had just confirmed her worst fears had been right on target.
What would Rafael say when she told him?
She walked down the street, took deep breaths until she stopped trembling, then climbed back into the tiny car that was used by the staff. She drove north through the thick traffic to the outskirts of Beyoğlu.
They’d been back in Istanbul for only a few hours, but already everything had changed between them. Rafael had immediately gone to his home office and barked out orders to various assistants about the upcoming real estate deal he was hoping to have signed tonight. And all the house staff had rushed to her with their questions about the final preparations for the dinner party.
Louisa had become his employee again. Rafael had become her boss.
They’d left the lovers behind on the island. Left them behind forever.
Now, Louisa stared out at the busy traffic, colorful billboards and old buildings of the city through the grimy glass. The car needed to be washed, she thought dimly. She’d have to tell the chauffeur’s assistant when she got back…
Should she even tell Rafael she was pregnant?
Her great-aunt’s words came back to her. Always be honest, child. Tell the truth, even if it hurts. Better to hurt now than twice as much later.
But Louisa wasn’t so sure. She’d saved five years of her salary in Europe, since she’d never taken time to travel or see the sights. She’d always told herself she mustn’t be selfish—Mr. Cruz’s needs must come first. She’d told herself she would see the sights of Europe later. Somehow, that time had never come.
And what did she have to show for it? She was just five years older. Pregnant. Alone!
The shaking vibration of the little car as she drove north on the old road was hypnotic.
Pregnant.
As she drove past the mansion’s gate, she barely noticed the security guard’s respectful greeting. She parked the car, informed the chauffeur’s assistant that the car needed attention, then went into the house.
Everything looked beautiful for Rafael’s birthday dinner tonight. Every room was filled with flowers, autumn roses from the garden supplemented with pepperberry stems and dark orange Asiatic lilies. As this was his first dinner party at his home in Istanbul, Louisa had planned it with care, choosing a menu rich with the exotic flavors of the city. Even now, the Turkish cook, who’d fortunately recovered from his earlier illness, was rushing around the kitchen and barking orders to his assistants to prepare the midye dolmasi, mussels stuffed with spiced rice, the sea bass stew, lamb kebabs and a variety of fruits and pastries for dessert.
She herself had made one of the desserts. It was not a traditional Turkish recipe, so it did not fit in with the menu, but she knew it was Rafael’s favorite and so she’d made it that morning anyway. For his birthday. Because she loved him. It had taken her an hour, but she’d carefully prepared her specialty dessert, caramel macadamia brownies with white chocolate chips.
She’d wanted to make his first dinner here special. But since he intended to put the house on the market tomorrow, it would also be his last. Now, looking around her, she felt a lump in her throat.
She’d wanted everything to be perfect for him. She’d made his home beautiful, made his life comfortable and full of ease. She’d sacrificed her every need for his. And now it was over. Now it was done. Once she told him she was pregnant, she would lose everything.
The job she loved. The man she loved.
Where would she go, without him to be both her albatross and her star? What would she do without him, all alone?
Slowly, heavily, she started to go up the stairs to her room. As she passed the study, she heard one of his assistants say, “Mademoiselle Lepetit is on the phone for you, sir.”
Louisa froze on the stair.
Dominique Lepetit was a beautiful French starlet famous mostly for her time spent pouting while topless, posing for the paparazzi during the Cannes Film Festival. Blond, curvaceous and cruel—she was everything that most men seemed to want in a woman.
“Tell her I’m busy,” came Rafael’s curt reply, and Louisa exhaled. She hadn’t realized until then how very much, in spite of everything, she wanted him to be faithful to her.
Rafael Cruz, faithful to any woman? She mocked herself as she climbed slowly up the stairs to her room. Had the pregnancy hormones kicked in already? She must really be out of her mind!
But he’d refused Dominique Lepetit’s phone call. Could a man change?
Could he understand that sometimes fate changed people’s lives in unexpected ways—for the better?
When she reached her room, she closed the door behind her, leaning against it for strength. She looked down in wonder, putting her hands on her belly as a new realization occurred to her.
Pregnant. A new life was growing inside her—Rafael’s child. A smile lifted her lips. A baby. A sweet-smelling baby to cuddle in her arms, to love forever. Her parents had died long ago, and she’d been estranged from her younger sister for five years. But with this baby, she would finally have a family of her own. A reason to create a real home, after so many years alone.
Had Katie felt like this when she’d first found out she was pregnant?
Louisa pushed away the unbidden thought. She didn’t want to think about Katie. Didn’t want to think about the niece or nephew she’d never met. The child must be almost five now, probably with brothers and sisters. And Matthias Spence as their father…
She’d tried not to think about Matthias for years. But to her surprise, the thought of him no longer hurt her the same way. Because she’d never really cared about him? She’d worked for him for only a few months before he’d proposed to her. She hadn’t known him half so well as she knew Rafael.
Or perhaps it was because her relationship with Matthias seemed so laughably in the past, the crush of a schoolgirl long ago, compared to the enormity of being pregnant with Rafael’s baby.
How could she tell Rafael the news?
Straightening her shoulders, Louisa went to her closet. She pushed through all the plain, serviceable clothes and pulled something out of the back, covered by plastic. Taking it out, she stared down at a sexy black bustier dress.
The last time she’d worn this, she’d been an engaged woman. Her sister had been visiting for a month from college, and had insisted they go shopping. “You’re so lucky,” Katie had said wistfully. “Going from a live-in housekeeper to a rich man’s wife.” “I love him,” Louisa had replied, smiling. But she’d allowed Katie to talk her into spending an entire paycheck in one splurge on the dress for their engagement party. Louisa had hoped to look pretty for Matthias, and try her best to impress his friends. Then a few weeks later, an hour before their engagement party began, her nineteen-year-old sister had asked to speak to her privately.
“How could you?” Louisa had gasped a few moments later. “You’re my sister. How could you do this to me?”
“I’m sorry!” Katie had cried. “I never meant to get pregnant. But I can’t believe you even love him. If you did, you wouldn’t have kept him at arm’s length, refusing to sleep with him until you were married! Who does that anymore?”
“I do,” Louisa had choked out, and grabbing her purse, she’d run from the house. She’d run as far away from Miami as she could, all the way to Paris.
She’d nearly thrown the dress in the trash five years ago. But instead, for some reason, she’d kept it. Now, the sexy black dress was the one item of clothing from her old life, before she’d been afraid of love, before she’d disappeared from the world to walk the earth like a ghost.
As she put on the dress, Louisa told herself she had no illusions that Rafael would love her; he would certainly never marry her. She only prayed he might love and accept their coming child. And that was the reason—the only reason!—that she put it on.
It was a little loose from her weight loss over the last few years, all the time she’d spent without time to exercise or sit down and eat meals or take care of herself properly. But when she added a belt, the dress still looked nice. She brushed her dark hair, leaving it tumbling and lustrous down her shoulders. She took off her black-rimmed plastic glasses and put in contact lenses. She was out of practice after wearing glasses for so long. She added some mascara to her lashes and some deep red lipstick on her mouth, then surveyed herself in the mirror for the effect.
After so many years, she almost didn’t recognize herself.
She looked pretty.
Louisa prayed it would help. Because she was terrified.
As she went downstairs, she could hear the first guests starting to arrive outside. She saw Rafael at the base of the stairs and stopped, gripping the polished wood of the railing. She closed her eyes as she took a single calming breath, her hand on her belly. Could this night be anything like her deepest dreams?
“I’m pregnant, Rafael,” she would say.
His gray eyes would widen. He’d gasp. Then he’d take her into his arms. “I am glad,” he’d say fiercely. “Of course I want this baby. And I want you. You are the only woman for me, querida.” Looking down at her, he would lift her chin and whisper tenderly, “I love you, Louisa.”
“Louisa.”
She opened her eyes to see Rafael looking up at her from the bottom of the stairs. He was frowning at her as if she’d dyed her hair purple and dressed like the Easter bunny.
“Why are you dressed like that?” he demanded, coldly surveying her from head to toe.
It wasn’t quite the reaction she’d been hoping for, but she tried to smile as she walked down the stairs—carefully, on her four-inch black patent high heels.
“For the party,” she said. She stopped one step above him. He still wouldn’t smile back at her. “For your birthday,” she tried again.
Instead of looking pleased, Rafael scowled. “You are going to attract attention like that.”
A servant should always be invisible. The rule had been drummed into her for ten months. After her parents had died, Louisa had given up her chance at a college scholarship to stay home and take care of her little sister and ailing great-aunt. But her aunt had left Louisa a small inheritance, which she’d used to attend butler school to become a certified household manager. You are not a person to your employer. You are a tool in his service. Serve invisibly. Never invade your employer’s privacy or force yourself upon his notice. To do so will cause embarrassment to you both.