‘This is all too weird. I need time. I’ve changed my mind, I think…’

‘Not an option.’

Without any warning at all he bent his head and pressed his mouth to hers.

The hot, hungry kiss did not start slow and build. It was hard, demanding, and began at a mind-blowing level of intimacy that nothing could have prepared her for. As his mouth moved with innate sensuality across her own the heat flared inside her, and her senses were flooded with the texture and taste of him.

Kim Lawrence lives on a farm in rural Anglesey. She runs two miles daily and finds this an excellent opportunity to unwind and seek inspiration for her writing! It also helps her keep up with her husband, two active sons, and the various stray animals which have adopted them. Always a fanatical consumer of fiction, she is now equally enthusiastic about writing. She loves a happy ending!

Recent titles by this author:

THE BRUNELLI BABY BARGAIN

DESERT PRINCE, DEFIANT VIRGIN

MISTRESS: PREGNANT BY THE SPANISH BILLIONAIRE

BY

KIM LAWRENCE

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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MISTRESS: PREGNANT BY THE SPANISH BILLIONAIRE

CHAPTER ONE

THE doctor was leaving the Castillo d’Oro when the sound of a helicopter low overhead stopped him in his tracks. As he paused, his hand shading his eyes from the sun, it landed and a tall figure disembarked.

The figure, immediately recognisable even at a distance, appeared to see him and hit the ground running, reaching the doctor’s side before the helicopter had lifted off again. He had covered the hundred metres or so with a speed and grace that in the medic’s envious opinion would not have looked out of place on an athletic track.

‘How are you, Luiz?’

The question was strictly rhetorical.

There were few people who looked as little in need of his care as Luiz Felipe Santoro. Despite his exertion, the hand extended to the doctor was cool and dry, and its owner, not even breathing hard, presented his usual immaculate appearance complete with formal tailored suit and sober silk tie.

The doctor always found the vitality this young man projected slightly exhausting and today was no exception.

It was hard to guess looking at him now that Luiz Santoro had once been a delicate child who had suffered more than his fair share of childhood ailments including asthma.

His delicate constitution combined with an adventurous—some called it reckless—personality meant the doctor had treated the young Luiz for many bumps and bruises, and on one occasion a broken limb.

It seemed likely to the doctor that it was that streak of adventure that his parents, before they had left him in the care of his grandmother, had tried unsuccessfully to quash that made Luiz, to quote his grandmother, ‘the only member of this family I can stomach.’

That, of course, was on the occasions her favourite grandson hadn’t incited her wrath by refusing to jump through one of her hoops, but then when the two people involved were strong-minded individuals, both incapable of compromise, there were bound to be sparks.

It struck the doctor as ironic really that the only member of the family that neither wanted nor needed the fortune the rest of his family eyed so covetously was likely to inherit. Luiz, with his steel-trap mind and competitive streak, had made his first million before he was twenty-one and was already incredibly wealthy in his own right.

‘I’m surprised to see you. Your office told me you were mid Atlantic on your way to New York when I rang.’

‘I was.’ Luiz dismissed his altered travel arrangements with a wave of his long brown fingers. ‘How is my grandmother?’

The medic felt the sweat break out across his brow as he met, with as much composure as he could summon, the younger man’s dark eyes. It seemed to him that there was more than a hint of the ruthlessness the press spoke of in his dark, penetrating gaze.

The doctor tried hard to put a positive spin on his account of his patient’s health, but Doña Elena’s health was not what it had been.

Luiz summed up the situation in his usual concise manner. ‘So you are saying, though she has improved slightly since you contacted me, it is possible my grandmother might not get better.’

Luiz had always prided himself on being a realist, but this oddly was the first time he had allowed himself to believe that his grandmother was not indestructible. Recognising that should not hit him so hard—her decline was inevitable—but that did not stop him feeling as if he’d just been kicked in the guts.

The doctor sighed and looked sympathetic. ‘I’m sorry it could not be better news, Luiz,’ he said, struggling to gauge the younger man’s reaction. It was not easy when his eyes gave as much away as the mirrored surface of dark sunglasses. ‘Of course if I am needed…’

Luiz, his expression sombre, inclined his head in acknowledgement of the courtesy. ‘Goodbye, Doctor.’

He was still standing watching the man leave, thinking about the great gaping hole the death of his grandmother would leave, when a cheery voice hailed him.

‘Luiz!’

He turned in response to his name to see Ramon, his grandmother’s estate manager, approaching at a trot.

Ramon had replaced the previous manager five years earlier. Experiencing a lot of resistance in the early days of his tenure, he had appealed to Luiz for support in his efforts to bring about some much-needed changes to the estancia set high in the Sierra Nevada, where tradition was important and his modernising ways were viewed with suspicion.

Over the years the two men had developed not just a relaxed working relationship, but a friendship. When Luiz had discovered the desperate condition of his grandmother’s finances—she had taken some appalling advice and put all her financial eggs in one basket; they had smashed—Ramon’s expertise and energy had helped him to save the estancia from imminent financial ruin.

Luiz was grateful that his grandmother still remained blissfully ignorant of the personal funds he had poured into the failing estate and how close she had come to losing it.

‘Surprise visit,’ the other man observed as he approached.

‘You could say that,’ Luiz agreed, unfastening his tie from his throat and loosing the top button of his shirt.

‘Your grandmother…?’

Luiz nodded.

Ramon winced and clapped a sympathetic hand to the other man’s shoulder before tentatively asking, ‘Not a good time, I know, but I was wondering should I go ahead with the preparations for next week’s birthday celebrations or…?’

‘Go ahead with them,’ Luiz agreed before turning the subject to matters he felt more comfortable discussing. ‘Has anything else come up?’

‘It’s funny you should say that.’

Luiz, clasping a hand to the back of his head as he rotated it to relieve the tension that was tying his shoulder muscles in knots, missed the flicker of amusement that crossed Ramon’s face. Brow puckered in concentration, he glanced at his wristwatch.

‘Give me an hour to see my grandmother, change and shower…’

‘This item that has come up is actually of the immediate variety.’

There was a flicker of interest in Luiz’s eyes as he asked, ‘How immediate?’

‘Immediate as in there is a woman, a pretty woman, demanding to see you.’

‘A woman!’

‘Pretty woman.’

‘I was thinking more along the lines of a problem with the plumbing or a disaster with the first press of olives,’ Luiz admitted. ‘And does this woman…sorry, pretty woman—and I have to say, Ramon, it pains me that you would think that would make a difference—have a name?’

‘She is a Miss Nell Frost. English, I believe.’

Luiz shook his head and shrugged dismissively. The name rang no bells. ‘Never heard of her.’

‘Pity. I was hoping she was your birthday present for Doña Elena’s birthday—the next Mrs Santoro. Now that would make her day.’ When his joke fell flat Ramon shrugged and asked, ‘Got any other ideas?’

‘Ideas?’ Luiz, who couldn’t see the problem, frowned. ‘Just tell her it is not convenient, suggest she makes an appointment.’

He began to walk away but Ramon followed him.

‘It won’t work. Neither will threats, charm or bribery because I’ve already tried and failed.’

Luiz felt a surge of impatience. How hard could it be to get rid of one unwanted visitor?

‘Have Security remove her.’ His expression revealed that he was amazed this had not already been done. ‘Or better still, get Sabina to give her her marching orders.’

‘Sabina has tried. It was she who suggested that you might like to speak with the young lady.’

Luiz raised a brow. Sabina held the official title of housekeeper, but in reality she was far more and in this household her suggestions carried as much weight as his grandmother’s orders. He gave a resigned sigh. ‘Where is she?’

‘She has been sitting on the south lawn for the last hour or so, and it’s warm.’

Luiz raised his brows at the understatement. It was thirty-plus degrees in the shade. ‘Why has she been sitting on the south lawn?’

‘I believe it is in the nature of a protest.’

‘A protest,’ Luiz echoed. ‘Against what?’

The other man struggled against a smile. ‘Why, something to do with you, I believe. Did I mention she is very pretty?’ he added.

CHAPTER TWO

NELL lifted her hand to shade her eyes from the sun that beat down on her unprotected head. The throbbing pain in her temples and behind her eyes felt uncomfortably similar to the early stages of a migraine.

She dragged her hand down her forehead to blot the salty rivulets that ran down her face. Her skin felt gritty and hot.

How long had she been sitting here? This morning certainly seemed like several lifetimes ago, she thought, pulling the creased and crumpled e-mail printout from her pocket. She had lost track of time; actually she was finding it increasingly difficult to focus her wandering thoughts.

She didn’t know who had been more surprised when she had sat down and delivered her ultimatum, her or the man with the warm smile. He had been so nice she felt a bit guilty, but mingled with the guilt had been a weird sense of liberation. After spending most of her adult life being accommodating and putting her plans on hold for other people, now it was her turn to be obstinate and awkward.

‘I’m actually quite good at it,’ she discovered with a smile.

Luiz, who was approaching the solitary figure sitting in the middle of several acres of carefully manicured lawn, stopped when she spoke.

The voice was low and with an unexpectedly sexy rasp that was a lot more grown up than she appeared to be. Ramon had misled him when he had said woman—the female sitting there was, he decided, a girl.

A girl with hair that shone honeyed gold in the sun, dressed in a light blue summer dress that revealed slim, shapely calves. She might be shapely all the way up to her delectable lips but the dress was not fitted to her slim shape.

As he continued to observe her as yet unseen a sudden gust of warm air lifted the skirt of her unfitted dress and suggested the shapeliness went at least thigh-high.

Had he not had more important things on his mind… Had she not been too young, and possibly unstable—she was talking to herself, after all—Luiz just might, he conceded, have been interested.

But as none of the above conditions applied he could view her with total objectivity.

‘From now on everyone is going to give in to me. I’m a powerful and strong woman. God, I’m not even in my prime yet. Where has the man with the warm smile gone—to call for rein-forcements or get Luiz Felipe slimy snake Santoro?’ Liking the alliteration she smiled and wondered if she’d had too much sun.

‘He went to get Luiz Felipe Santoro.’ Accustomed to hearing himself described in slightly more flattering terms—at least to his face—Luiz was curious to discover where this young woman had formed this opinion of his character.

Nell, who had been unaware that she was voicing her thoughts out loud until that moment, focused on the shiny leather shoes a few feet away.

‘Who are you?’ Luiz asked as his brain struggled to provide a scenario that would put this odd girl here, now.

Nell’s gaze stayed at knee level. ‘I’m the one asking the questions,’ she retorted belligerently. ‘Who are you?’

‘I’m Luiz Santoro.’

A sigh of relief left her dry lips as Nell got shakily to her feet.

The man who had materialised was tall, dark and handsome, though the generic term hardly seemed appropriate considering the unique individuality of his features.

Her glance lingered on his face. The man had a firm, clean-shaven jaw, high forehead, golden skin stretched across strong cheekbones, and a wide sensually sculpted mouth.

As her eyes connected with his hooded, unblinking and slightly impatient stare Nell experienced an odd little jolt that ran like an electric shock all the way down to her toes.

She blinked to break the connection. His eyes really were extraordinary. Set beneath strongly defined black brows, they were deep-set and very dark, almost black, flecked with silver and framed by the only feature that was not aggressively male—long dark curling lashes that any woman would have coveted.

She started to shake her head, only stopping when it made her world spin unpleasantly. ‘You can’t be Luiz Felipe Santoro.’ She’d said it so often that the name was starting to roll off her tongue as if she were a native.

For a start off he was no student or teenager… Had Lucy said he was or had that been an assumption?

And that was the least of it. Her thought processes moved sluggishly as she looked up at him, her critical stare trained on the face of the man whom her niece intended to marry. Actually there was little to criticise on an aesthetic level at least, his face was about as perfect as faces got if you liked a profile that could have come from an ancient Greek statue.

And the rest of him… Nell swallowed, uncomfortable with her visceral response to the rest of him, which was silly. His body was no better than any number of Olympic swimmers she had watched cleave cleanly through the water of a swimming pool.

Of course, they had not been standing mere feet away from her. Other senses like smell—he really did smell exceptionally good in a warm male, musky sort of way—had not been involved.

‘I can’t be?’ The sinfully sexy Spaniard with the autocratic bearing sounded more curious than put out. ‘Why not?’

‘You have to be, what…?’ Her assessing gaze moved up from his toes to the top of his dark gleaming head. All of it appeared to be hard muscle and bone and aggressively male. Her stomach muscles reacted to all that undiluted masculinity and flipped. ‘Thirty?’

‘Thirty-two.’

‘Thirty-two,’ she echoed.

Luiz was wondering why she looked so peculiarly repulsed by the admission when she added, ‘That is disgusting.’

An energising burst of anger put strength back into Nell’s legs as she took a purposeful step towards the Spaniard. Self-satisfaction was not in her experience an attractive trait, and men this good-looking were generally very self-satisfied.

Of course, her experience was limited.

‘You know what I think of men who prey on impressionable young girls?’

‘I feel sure you are going to tell me,’ he drawled laconically.

His flippant attitude incensed Nell further. ‘You think this is some sort of joke? This is a young girl’s future we are talking about. Lucy is too young to get married.’

‘Who is Lucy?’

The blonde pursed her lips and continued to regard him as though he were some sort of depraved monster. The novelty value of being verbally abused was already wearing thin but the pleasure of staring at her heaving bosom would take a lot longer to pall.

The kick of his libido was irrational, but sexual desire did have a habit of bypassing the logic circuits. Fortunately he never had any problem keeping his own carnal instincts on a short leash.

‘Don’t play the innocent with me.’

With those eyes and those lips, she reflected, her eyes lingering on the sensual curve, such an effort would be a waste of time. A mouth like that had nothing to do with innocence and everything to do with decadence. It also suggested he would be a pretty good kisser—not that Nell had any desire to put her theory to the test, but she could see how an inexperienced girl like Lucy might be fatally tempted.

‘Do you even intend to marry her or was that some line to get her into bed?’

‘I do not actually intend to marry anyone.’

A tide of angry colour washed over her already hot fair skin as Nell missed the shadow that passed across his face and just heard the shameless admission.

‘And actually I have never had to promise marriage to get anyone into bed.’

Now that she could believe—the man had all the qualifications to be a serial seducer. ‘So why does Lucy think she’s marrying you?’

‘I really couldn’t say.’

‘Maybe this will refresh your memory,’ she said, extending the shaking hand that held the e-mail to him.

When he made no attempt to take it Nell let her hand drop down.

‘“Dear Aunt Nell—”’ she quoted.

‘You are Aunt Nell?’ She looked like no aunt he had ever met.

Frowning darkly at the interruption, Nell nodded. ‘Yes. “Dear Aunt Nell,”’ she continued, not referring to the transcript—she had read the damned thing so many times since yesterday the contents were burned into her memory.

‘“I arrived here last week. Valencia is beautiful and very hot. I have met the most marvellous man, Luiz Felipe Santoro. He is working at an incredible hotel here called the Hotel San Sebastian. We’re very in love—he’s my soul mate,”’ Nell recited, staring daggers at the Spaniard who had so far not even had the decency to look embarrassed.

‘“I can hardly believe it myself but we’ve decided to get married as soon as possible.”’ At this point Nell’s voice broke and she added bitterly, ‘I suppose you know she’s only on a gap year and has been travelling around Europe for the last six months. She’s got a brilliant future, a scholarship to university…’

He arched a brow and sounded politely interested. ‘No, I didn’t know.’

A growling noise escaped Nell’s throat before she squeezed her eyes shut and finished in a halting monotone. ‘“You’ll love him as much as I do, or almost as much ha ha! I know you’ll know the best way to break it to Mum and Dad. Love and kisses, Lucy.”’

She stuck out her chin, glared up at him and wished she didn’t have such a height disadvantage. ‘Well, what do you have to say now? Are you still denying it? Are you suggesting Lucy made it all up?’

‘I’m impressed.’

Nell’s self-righteous anger tilted over into confusion. He wasn’t acting like a guilty man, but maybe he was one of those sociopaths you read about—the ones who had no moral compass, no values?

‘Impressed by what?’

‘You had a name of a hotel and my name and you found me. That is impressive.’

Nell gave a triumphant little cry of, ‘So you admit it is you, then.’ Before adding with feeling, ‘It wasn’t easy finding you.’

That was just about the understatement of the century. Her night flight had arrived at the airport very early for her to find that her luggage, such as it was, had ended up somewhere else. The people at the snooty hotel where she had stuck out like a sore thumb beside the affluent and well-dressed guests had been very uncooperative, if not damned rude, when she had mentioned Luiz Felipe Santoro. They clearly intended taking his home address to their graves.

If it hadn’t been for the sweet fatherly doorman who had chased after her and suggested she might find the man she was looking for at the Castillo d’Oro her search might have stopped right there.

The only hire car she had been able to afford had no air conditioning and to top it all she’d got lost three times on the way to the castillo. The distance on the map was deceptive. Although quite close to the Mediterranean, the historic estancia set high on a lush plateau in the Sierra Nevada was not easy to reach.

It had been the day from hell and only a determination to save her niece from making a terrible mistake had kept Nell going.

And all the time at the back of her mind there had been the question, what if all this was pointless? What if Lucy had already married her Spaniard?

‘Tell me,’ she pleaded, catching hold of his jacket sleeve. ‘Are you married?’

Something dark, bleak and very forbidding flickered into his eyes. For a moment Nell thought he was not going to reply.

‘I was, but not now.’

Oh, my God. Lucy had not only got involved with an older man, she had got involved with an older man who already had a failed marriage behind him, and if his manner when he spoke of it was anything to go by the break up had not been amicable. But then he did not strike Nell as the sort of man who would shrug off a divorce and say, ‘Let’s stay good friends.’

‘You’re a resourceful woman.’

‘I’m a woman who is fast running out of patience.’ Nell, pleased at the crisp delivery, tilted her chin to a ‘don’t mess with me’ angle. ‘I want to see Lucy and I want to see her now. I don’t know what your job is here, but I can’t imagine your employers will be too impressed if I tell them what you’ve been up to!’

‘Are you threatening me?’

‘Yes!’ And not doing a very good job of it. It was difficult to imagine a man looking less threatened than Lucy’s lover… She grimaced—Lucy’s lover. That sounded so wrong on so many levels!

On the silly and shallow level it hardly seemed fair her teenage niece was now officially more sexually experienced than she was.

‘I do not work here.’

Nell, who suddenly realised she still had hold of his arm, regarded him with suspicion. ‘You’re a guest at this hotel?’ She gave a tiny gasp of relief when her fingers finally responded to the message from her brain and let go. The impression of hard, lean strength lingered even when she rubbed her hand against the canvas bag slung around her neck.

‘Not a guest, and not a hotel—this is the home of my grandmother, Doña Elena Santoro.’

The colour faded from her cheeks as Nell turned her head and stared at the vast Castillo d’Oro, a fortified stone edifice—a real castle complete with turrets.

‘You live here?’ That explained the superior attitude and the faint air of disdain, the man obviously considered anyone who didn’t own a castle beneath him. Well, she for one was not impressed by inherited wealth.

She shook her head, not waiting for his confirmation, and said firmly, ‘That doesn’t change anything.’

‘I’m not the man you’re looking for. I’ve never met your niece.’

Frustrated and tired, tears springing to her eyes, Nell, who rarely cried, blinked angrily.

‘I don’t believe you!’ She struggled not to, because if he was telling the truth she was no nearer finding Lucy than she had been this morning.

‘But I do know the man you’re looking for.’

Nell looked at him with a mixture of hope and suspicion.

‘Come indoors and I’ll explain.’

‘I’m not going anywhere. I’m not budging from this spot!’ Nell said, folding her arms across her chest.

‘Have it your way, but I wouldn’t like to have your epidermis tomorrow.’ He glanced up at the relentlessly blue sky, then back at her face. ‘You have the sort of fair skin that burns.’ A slightly distracted expression drifted across his face as he stared at the pale curve of her throat.

‘And freckles,’ Nell murmured with a sigh.

The comment seemed to wake him from his reverie. Possibly he was feeling the heat too, Nell thought, noticing the bands of high colour that attracted her eye to the slashing contours of his marvellous high cheekbones.

CHAPTER THREE

THE dull pain drumming in her temples intensified as Nell watched him stroll back to the castillo not pausing even once to look back. He was so damned sure that she’d follow him the way women had no doubt been following him all his adult life—not that she would be following him in the same sense.

She would have loved to have the luxury of calling his bluff, but that gesture would have been pretty self-defeating. If he was speaking the truth and he knew who Lucy was with she had no choice but to follow him. And his point about the heat was valid; the protective factor of the moisturiser she had used that morning had to have worn off hours ago.

The cool inside the stone-walled castle was sheer bliss after the oppressive heat of the Valencian sun. She hurried, her feet echoing on the stone floors, to catch up with him.

‘So who is the man?’ Nell asked, trotting to pass him.

She turned and came to an abrupt halt. He had to follow suit or fall over her. He didn’t do that, but he did get awfully close—close enough for her to receive a pretty hefty jolt as she got too close to the raw sexual aura he projected.

It passed through her body like an electrical current and was the weirdest and most disturbing thing that had ever happened to her. She pressed a hand to her heaving chest and hoped that he attributed her breathless condition to a lack of fitness combined with the altitude.

He glanced down, his dark eyes skimming her face. ‘My cousin.’

Nell opened her mouth to demand more information when he placed a hand on the wall above her head. Nell closed her eyes and edged closer to panic as he leaned into her, his big body curling over her. She held her breath, then released it a moment later as she found herself pushed through a door behind her and into a big, light, airy room.

‘Sit down. I’ll order some refreshments.’

Nell ignored the offer—a pretty pointless defiance considering her knees were literally shaking. ‘Your cousin?’ Was he just trying to wriggle out of it? Send her off on a false trail?

‘It fits. He had a holiday job at the hotel you spoke of. I arranged it for him myself.’

She still wasn’t convinced. ‘What about the name?’

‘We were both christened Luiz Felipe. This is not the first time confusion has arisen, but it is the most…amusing.’

‘You’re both called Luiz Felipe.’

‘I know—an appalling lack of imagination. We were both named after our grandfather, but in the family we call him Felipe usually.’

‘So how old is this cousin of yours?’ Nell’s feelings were mixed. While she was obviously relieved that Lucy hadn’t got mixed up with this man—hopefully his cousin was not the similar type of predatory male—it did mean that she still had no idea where Lucy was.

‘I’m not sure.’ He arched a brow. ‘Eighteen, nineteen?’

Nell stared. ‘You’re asking me? Just how many cousins do you have?’

Luiz leaned his elbow on the mantel of the carved stone fireplace and moved a heavy candlestick with his forefinger. His air of preoccupation incensed Nell.

‘I’m sorry if I’m boring you.’

The acid observation swung Luiz’s attention back to the figure standing there with her hands planted on her slim hips. ‘Sorry.’ He produced a grin that had no hint of apology in it and answered her question. ‘Just the one.’

‘And you don’t know how old he is?’

‘We are not what you would call close.’

‘But he’s your cousin.’ She searched his dark face for any sign he was being facetious and found none. ‘Your family.’

‘Families are all different and I think you will find that my attitude to family is one that more people could readily identify with than your own.’

Nell looked at him, appalled. ‘Don’t you care if your cousin ruins his life?’

‘A person learns by their mistakes. Perhaps your niece will learn from hers?’

The odd inflection in his deep voice that made Nell wonder what his mistakes had been was absent as he added flippantly, ‘And who am I to stand in the way of true love?’

Nell, her eyes narrowed, did not bother to disguise her utter disgust as she glared at him. ‘Ha. The truth is you don’t give a damn about anyone else. You’re utterly and totally selfish—you’ve no intention of lifting a finger to stop your cousin making the biggest mistake of his life because you’re utterly self-centred.’

She was midway through accusing him of possessing no family feeling when Ramon’s joke came back to Luiz. The future Mrs Santoro! His lips curled into a wry smile that faded as he recognised the element of truth in Ramon’s joke—a bride would be his grandmother’s most precious birthday present.

Luiz was inclined initially to reject the crazy, though intriguing, idea forming in his head, because it was so obviously, well…crazy. He could not pinpoint the exact moment that it stopped being crazy but actually almost logical, but suddenly he found himself asking—Why not?

He would never be able to give his grandmother the wife and heir she longed for him to provide, so wasn’t this an alternative where nobody got hurt? Why shouldn’t he be studying the flushed and angry face of the future Mrs Santoro? It could work.

Why wait for her birthday?

There were always two ways of looking at a situation. Some people would think his idea a moment of inspiration while others would think it a moment of madness.

Luiz didn’t care about the label, he just cared about the result.

‘I have a proposition to put to you.’

Nell regarded him with an expression of baffled frustration. He had not even attempted to defend himself. She wasn’t even sure if he had heard a word she had said.

‘I know where they are.’

Her eyes widened. ‘Lucy and your cousin?’

He nodded.

‘So where…?’

He pushed aside the poignant image of the cottage by the sea where he and Rosa had lived and held up a hand to stop her. Fulfilling his side of the bargain he was proposing would mean him going there for the first time in many years. The first time since Rosa died.

‘First you need to do something for me.’

He saw the alarm flare in her eyes and sketched a cynical grin. ‘Relax, not that something. You’re really not my type.’

As if to challenge his careless contention the image that formed in his head of one perfect breast fitting perfectly into his hand momentarily vaporised every other thought.

‘Imagine my devastation,’ she snarled, irrationally deflated. ‘Forget the dramatic pause and get to the point—what do I have to do?’

‘Come and meet my grandmother.’

Nell’s face fell. ‘That’s it?’ Obviously there was a catch.

‘And go along with whatever I say.’

‘But I don’t understand why—?’

He cut across her with an autocratic shake of his dark head. There was no time for a question and answer session. If he paused long enough to think about this he strongly suspected that he’d bail.

‘I do not require you to understand. As I said, I simply require you to go along with anything I say—no matter what it is.’

‘But why?’

‘Do you want to find the lovers?’

Nell’s expression reflected her dilemma. ‘Oh, all right, then.’ What choice did she have? ‘And afterwards you’ll tell me where they are.’

‘Querida,’ he promised with a grin, ‘I’ll take you to them. Shake on it.’

Nell dragged her eyes away from the magnetic pull of his deep-set dark eyes and regarded the hand he held towards her for a long moment before finally extending her own.

As his cool fingers closed around hers Nell tried to ignore the warning voice in her head that told her she was making a big mistake.

It was a lot more difficult to ignore the prickle under her skin that had nothing to do with sunburn and a lot to do with their brief physical contact.

CHAPTER FOUR

THE castle was a maze. Nell followed Luiz for what felt like miles along stone-floored corridors before he finally halted.

‘This is my grandmother’s room.’ Luiz reached for the door and stopped. ‘Wait here. I will be back presently.’

Left with little choice but to obey his terse instruction, Nell began to study the large tapestry of brilliant colours on the wall opposite.

The battle scene it portrayed was nothing compared to the one being waged in her head. Just what are you doing, Nell? This is crazy, totally crazy. You don’t know this man—you don’t even know what you’ve agreed to and who’s to say he will keep his word?

Before she could totally lose her nerve Luiz Santoro returned. Without a word he took her left hand and slid a ring onto her finger.

‘What are you doing? What…w-what is that?’ she stammered, staring at her finger. The gold band felt heavy, a rose-coloured diamond surrounded by what she assumed were rubies in an antique setting.

She was no expert but it didn’t look like the sort of thing you found in a Christmas cracker.

He lifted his brows. ‘A ring.’

‘I can see that,’ she retorted crankily. ‘What is it doing on my finger?’

‘Window dressing.’

‘For what?’

‘That is not relevant.’

Nell shook her head and dug in her heels literally. ‘I’m not taking another step until you explain this thing.’ She waved the offending jewellery him.

Luiz studied her mutinous face for a moment, then gave a philosophical shake of his head. ‘My grandmother—’

‘The one who owns this house?’

His dark brows twitched into a straight line of disapproval at the interruption. ‘The one who own this house and the estancia it stands upon. She is ill…maybe…’

He paused, unwilling to voice the possibility, as if saying the thing made it more likely to happen. He was impatient with the lack of logic in his thought processes, but then when you cared for a person it was hard to always be logical.

He glanced down at the young woman who was staring up at him, suspicion and wariness reflected in her clear eyes, and thought, Logic does not feature in that glossy head at any level…just neat emotion.

It made her a frustrating person to negotiate with.

‘Maybe?’ Nell prompted.

‘Maybe even dying.’

Nell’s face dropped. ‘I’m sorry.’ It was hard to tell from his stony expression if her sympathy was either required or desired.

Not that the lack of emotion in his features meant he didn’t have any, she reminded herself. Give the man the benefit of the doubt—she had not cried at her father’s funeral or, for that matter, since. Pushing aside the thought, Nell focused on his dark face—too much focus because she immediately started to feel dizzy.

‘We all die, and my grandmother is eighty-five.’

Nell found the clinical pronouncement chilling, but not as chilling as the total lack of feeling in his voice or manner. She suspected he didn’t deserve the benefit of any doubt—the man was just plain cold.

‘I’m sorry your grandmother is ill, but that still doesn’t explain the ring—’ she waved her hand in an expansive gesture ‘—or any of this.’

‘It is her wish that I marry and provide an heir.’

Nell, her eyes wide—she was clearly dealing with someone who was delusional and possibly dangerous—started to shake her head and back away.

‘I care about Lucy, but if you think I’m going to…m-m…’ She shook her head again. ‘Some sacrifices I’m not willing to make. Let her leave the place to this other Luiz Felipe—he seems more than willing to marry.’ And for all she knew provide heirs! ‘God, I really need to find Lucy.’

For a split second he looked perplexed by her response. ‘Sacrifice? You think…?’ He threw back his dark head and laughed, a deep attractive sound. ‘I am not asking you to marry me, and Felipe would not make a suitable custodian for the estancia.’

Nell pursed her lips, perversely irritated that he appeared to find the idea so hilarious. ‘So you don’t want a wife.’

His expression sobered and she glimpsed something that wasn’t cold calculation flicker at the back of his eyes. It was stark, shocking pain.

‘I had a wife. I require no one to fill her place in my life or heart.’

Did that mean the ex-wife had walked…? The image of him as broken-hearted, discarded husband was one Nell’s imagination just wouldn’t expand to accommodate. Actually she felt a lot more comfortable believing he didn’t have a heart at all, let alone a bruised one, so she changed the subject.

‘So you think you’d be a…suitable custodian? Is that shorthand for you fancy yourself as king of the castle?’ He certainly had the regal manner. ‘So you don’t mind if your cousin gets the girl but not the money.’

‘There is no money.’

Nell rolled her eyes. ‘Sure there isn’t.’ She folded her arms across her chest and challenged, ‘So, if you don’t have an avaricious bone in your body—’ gorgeous body ‘—why this silliness?’ she finished, thinking she might well ask herself the same question. Stop drooling, Nell!

‘My grandmother raised me, she has taught me everything I know, I owe her everything and I wish her to die a happy woman.’

‘But…’

His eyes flashed as he frowned in exasperation and mimed a zipping motion across his mouth. ‘Will you be silent and let me finish?’

Nell’s chin went up as she viewed him, eyes narrowed in dislike. ‘If you get to the point.’

‘My grandmother is a redoubtable woman. She has carried the burden of running the estancia alone for many years. She was a young woman when her husband died. She does not want that for me. She wants me to be happy and she believes that for that I need a…’ he paused, his lips twisting into a cynical smile before he completed ‘…soul mate, a wife.’

‘Me? No way!’

‘My thought exactly.’

‘And I’m not lying for you.’

‘I’m not asking you to. I’m hoping that the ring will do the trick.’

‘But what if she doesn’t…?’ Nell gave an awkward grimace.

‘Die,’ he inserted, turning his head so that Nell could not see the muscle he could feel clenching in his cheek. ‘It is possible,’ he conceded. ‘She is tough and she has been ill before. If that happens…’ nothing in Luiz’s demeanour suggested how desperately he clung to that hope as he calmly outlined his hastily formed fall-back strategy ‘…I will simply explain that you have been forced to return to England. Long-distance love affairs are notoriously difficult and ours will die a natural death, possibly due, I think, to your infidelity.’

Nell stared. She almost believed it herself! ‘You seem to have thought of everything.’

He took her comment as a compliment and bowed his head in acknowledgement. ‘I have that reputation.’ And whether it was deserved or not it made him feared by his competitors.

That was not entirely a bad thing in the cutthroat world he operated in. A man used every advantage he had, and one advantage Luiz no longer had was the element of surprise that had enabled him as an unknown twenty-year-old to make his first million before the competition had become aware of his existence.

Now they knew he was there, but he enjoyed a challenge.

‘Maybe you’ve actually convinced yourself that you’re doing this to make her happy because you’re ashamed to admit how far you’d go to make sure you inherit this place?’

Luiz Santoro looked almost as shocked as Nell felt to hear her private speculation voiced out loud.

She took an involuntary step back as eyes that housed sheer molten rage connected with her own. Before she had a chance to be defensive or even sensibly scared it was gone, leaving her wondering if it had ever been there at all.

Luiz, on the point of ramming his financial success down her superior, self-righteous little throat, stopped himself. Why justify his actions to this girl, when he never justified himself to anyone?

Her opinion of him was of no consequence but defending himself would force him to question this.

‘You need not trouble yourself with my motivation or my self-delusion, just look sweet and in love,’ he mocked, placing a finger under her chin.

Nell, her pulse racing and no longer just from fear, held herself rigid while he studied her upturned features. ‘You don’t look in love.’ He sounded irritated by the discovery.

She pushed his hand away and directed her darting glance at some point behind him. Don’t panic, Nell—you can leave at any time you like. He can’t stop you.

All you have to do is walk away.

‘That’s because I’m not.’ She ran her tongue nervously across her dry lips and said, ‘This is all too weird. I need time. I’ve changed my mind. I think—’

‘Not an option.’

Without any warning at all he bent his head and pressed his mouth to hers.

The hot, hungry kiss did not start slow and build; it was hard, demanding, and began at a mind-blowing level of intimacy that nothing could have prepared her for. As his mouth moved with innate sensuality across her own the heat flared inside her and her senses were flooded with the texture and taste of him.

At the first erotic stabbing incursion of his tongue her insides dissolved and something inside her snapped. Suddenly she was kissing him back, her fingers spread out across his hard chest as she groaned into his mouth and pressed her body into his, responding to a frantic need to be closer.

When Luiz lifted his head he looked as dazed as she felt, but maybe she had imagined it because a second later he was removing her hands from his chest and pushing her through the door ahead of him.

‘And don’t think,’ he said in her ear.

Nell, her mind still numb with shock, thought, Walk away! But her will seemed to have deserted her, her body was nailed to the spot with shock.

Struggling to prove she still had a mind of her own…God, I kissed him back…she flashed him a killer look. ‘If you do that again I will make you regret it!’ she snapped.

Luiz, who was already regretting the impulsive action, did not respond. He looked at her lush lips and thought about the way she had tasted. Then he pushed the thought away. For a man who prided himself on his iron control it should have been a simple matter.

It wasn’t.

A man could not excel at everything and it was clear that he was not good at spontaneity…especially spontaneity that involved this woman.

Resentment and humiliation swirled through Nell’s veins. Calculatingly, he’d done that to shut her up and get her through the door and the worst part was it had worked!

And while she was reduced to a shell-shocked wreck by a simple kiss—just a kiss, what was wrong with her?—he was acting, it seemed to a mortified Nell, as if nothing had happened! I kissed him back!

Nell stumbled a little and his hand shot out to steady her and stayed at her elbow. She did not mistake the gesture for concern. He’s probably getting ready to rugby tackle me to the ground if I try and run, she thought.

A rugby tackle would have been infinitely preferable to a kiss…although rolling on the ground with him did present some worrying opportunities for making a fool of herself.

The room they entered was in shadow. Nell could make out the general outline of furniture and a frail figure propped up in a big carved bed. She spoke in Spanish but Luiz replied in English.

‘Surprise? I doubt it. Don’t tell me the jungle drums have not already told you I had arrived.’

Nell tried to slow her laboured breathing as she watched Luiz walk towards the bed and bend over it.

Seeing the walking frame beside the bed brought back a rush of memories and to her horror Nell felt her eyelids prickle with tears. Eight weeks and I cry now. Please, no, not now. Inch by inch she fought her way back to control, dabbing angrily at the moisture at the corners of her eyes.

‘I’ve brought you a visitor and she doesn’t speak Spanish.’

The contrast between his callous attitude to her moments earlier and the tenderness in his manner as he kissed the sunken cheek of the tiny figure lying in the bed increased the emotional ache in her throat. She remained stubbornly reluctant to endow him with finer feelings or motives, but if he didn’t love this old lady he was a very good actor.

‘This is Nell.’

How could anyone put so much expression into one word—one name?

It was astonishing, and her reaction to the warm husky intonation in his deep voice suggesting unspoken intimacies was no less shocking.

Luiz reached a hand towards her and she responded without thinking to the compelling message in his eyes and stepped forward, taking his hand. An embarrassing rush of heat passed through Nell’s body as he tugged her towards him and slipped his arm around her waist before pulling her into his body.

She suddenly felt a spasm of sympathy for Lucy. If his cousin had half this man’s seductive powers, then it was hardly surprising that her inexperienced niece had fallen so hard.

‘Turn that light on, Luiz.’

Nell blinked as the light from an angle lamp fell across her face.

‘Good bones…’ came the verdict. The sharp eyes slid thoughtfully back to her grandson’s face, before she returned her attention to Nell. ‘Not your usual type, Luiz.’

Tell me something I don’t know, thought Nell as to her relief Luiz aimed the light away from her eyes. Then prompted by the expression in his eyes, she held out her hand. Like some sort of puppet, observed the disgusted voice in her head.

‘Well, now I won’t have to change my will, Luiz,’ Doña Elena joked.

It took a couple of seconds for Nell to register the comment, and when she did she was gripped by a wave of disillusionment. She had wanted to know and now there was no doubt. It was quite irrational to feel so let down. People did unpleasant, low, nasty things when large sums of money were involved, so why should he be any different?

‘Were you going to leave it to Felipe?’

The standing joke between them raised a weak smile from the old lady and a horrified look from Nell. Elena Santoro, who was perfectly aware that her younger grandson had no fondness for the estancia that was, to quote him, ‘an anachronism in the modern world’, teased back.

‘Possibly.’ Felipe had even less enthusiasm for the responsibilities that came with it and he remained mystified by their grandmother’s stubborn determination to hang onto what he referred to as a damned money pit. He had been almost comically relieved when she had explained to him that it was her intention his cousin would inherit, but he would have her house in Seville and the art collection it contained.

Turning her head towards Nell, she asked, ‘You have met Felipe?’

Nell shook her head. ‘Not yet.’ She could almost feel sorry for him.

‘He is a good boy, artistic, but I expect he will grow out of that. You notice I do not speak of my sons. IfI left the estancia to them, Nell, they would split it up and sell it off to speculators before I was cold in my grave.’ She broke off as her slight frame was racked by hacking coughs. ‘I’m fine, don’t fuss, Luiz,’ she gasped breathlessly as she patted away his solicitous hand. ‘So when, Nell, are you going to marry my grandson?’

Luiz spoke for her. ‘We have not set a date yet.’

Despite her physical frailty there was nothing weak about the glare that was directed at Luiz. ‘Does the girl not have a voice, Luiz? Let her speak,’ she quavered imperiously.

Nell lifted her chin. If Luiz was scared about what she might say, he ought to be. ‘I can speak.’ She flashed Luiz a look of distaste and thought, Let him sweat.

‘Tell me about yourself.’

It was a request, not an order, but Nell was starting to realise this was not a lady who did requests.

‘What would you like to know? I’m twenty-five, a library assistant.’

‘How did Luiz come to meet an English library assistant?’

‘Perhaps it was fated.’

Luiz gave an enigmatic smile and smoothed Nell’s hair back from her brow as though, she thought as she fought the impulse to pull away, he had performed the tender act a hundred times before. You had to admire the man’s acting ability, if not his morals.

The old lady returned her attention to Nell and almost caught her rolling her eyes. ‘You have family?’

‘I have a sister and a brother, both older and both married with children.’

‘You live alone?’

‘I live with my dad,’ she said without thinking. Then she remembered and muttered, ‘So stupid, I keep forgetting. I lived with Dad.’

‘Your father died?’

Luiz, noticing for the first time the violet smudges beneath her big eyes, felt an unidentifiable emotion break loose inside him as she pressed the heels of her hands into her eyes and scrubbed them like a child before responding to his grandmother’s question.

‘Eight weeks ago.’ Beside her she was conscious of Luiz stiffening.

‘Eight weeks,’ she repeated in a softer, almost surprised voice. Weeks that had been filled with practicalities; there had been no time for grieving.

Lots of practicalities, she mused, thinking of the pile of packing cases she had left when she had jumped on the first flight available. The removals people would be arriving in the morning and there would be no one to let them in.

And Clare, who was arriving to collect the more valuable pieces of furniture that she had claimed for her own home, was going to be annoyed. Nell was conscious that the idea of her sister’s anger and the removal people standing on the doorstep ought to bother her more, but it didn’t.

‘The house was only on the market a week when it sold.’ You are telling them this why, Nell? ‘It would have been too big for me anyway.’

Clare and Paul had both said it was fine by them if she stayed on for a while, but she knew they had both been pleased when she had put the property straight on the market. They would both find the money from the sale useful. And as they had said, she could find a nice little place of her own.

‘Your father, he had been ill for a long time, Nell?’ There was a gentler note than she had yet heard in the old lady’s voice.

Nell nodded tiredly and registered Luiz say something that sounded angry in Spanish. His grandmother responded, saying, ‘Can’t you see she needs to talk? The little one has been bottling up her emotions.’

‘He had a stroke. It left him partially paralyzed down his left side…’ Nell sketched an explanatory sweeping motion down her side. ‘He had some mobility problems so I didn’t go to university.’

If she had taken her university place and not stayed on the option would have been a nursing home or sheltered accommodation and Nell knew how much her dad loved his home. And with a few modifications to the house he had become reasonably independent, to the point that before his death he had been pushing for Nell to go to college as a mature student.

‘But he was doing really well. That’s why it was such a shock when he…’ Her voice trailed away as she swallowed past the lump in her throat. ‘It was pneumonia.’

Nell heard her voice crack and thought, Please, no, not now, not here. Her grief lay lodged like an icy block in her chest. When it melted she knew there would be a lot of moisture and a lot of pain—but not now.

Luiz, watching as she forced her stiff features into a composed smile, felt her grief as a physical pain in his chest.

‘I told him that it was my choice to stay at home. I wanted to be there with him. There was no need for him to feel guilty about university, but…’

Nell didn’t connect herself with the strangled whimper. The second sob she felt as it worked its way up from deep down inside her and escaped and then she couldn’t stop them.

As the tears began to flow she turned her head and found Luiz’s chest. A hand came up to hold her there and another wrapped around her ribs, hauling her up against him.

‘This was not a good idea,’ Luiz, his face set like stone, said to his grandmother as he cradled her shaking body. The sound of her sobs tore him up inside; he had never felt so impotent in his life, or more responsible.

He should, he told himself, have recognised her vulnerability, but he hadn’t and this was the result.

He rested his chin on the top of Nell’s head and rocked her in his arms. ‘It will be all right,’ he soothed.

‘The girl has a sense of duty. I like that.’

‘I think she’s had enough,’ he said abruptly, before he swept her casually into his arms and walked out of the room with her.

CHAPTER FIVE

NELL’S sobs went straight to an unprotected portion of Luiz’s heart. Each sob seemed to be dragged from deep inside her. It was painful to listen to, to feel as they racked her body.

While she wept Sabina floated silently into the room, took in the scene at a glance and, after nodding at him, left. When she returned a short time later she was carrying a tray laden with sandwiches and cake, a coffee pot and two cups.

Luiz, nodding as she left, would not have minded the addition of something more stimulating. It was not a need he felt when facing the collapse of a multimillion-dollar deal, but right now… He glanced down and winced. It seemed to him the tears would never stop. But gradually, over the next few minutes, to his relief they lessened until she gave a final deep, shuddering sigh and lifted her head from his shoulder, her damp cheek brushing his as she did so.

He made no attempt to stop her as she slid to the opposite end of the sofa.

Weak in the aftermath of the emotional excesses, Nell lifted her hand to push away the damp skein of hair that had flopped into her eyes.

‘I’m sorry,’ she muttered, not looking at him.

It bothered her that she had lost control, but for some reason it bothered her a lot more that she had lost control in front of this man of all people.

‘I’m fine now.’ Her level look dared him to contradict her.

‘Of course you are,’ he said, pushing a box of tissues supplied by the ever-alert Sabina her way.

‘About your father—’

Nell blew her nose. ‘I don’t want to talk about it,’ she said in a fierce little voice. ‘You’ve got what you want.’

Luiz, on whom her unfriendly attitude had not been wasted, angled a questioning brow. ‘I have?’

‘Well, your grandmother’s going to leave you her loot, isn’t she?’ She lifted her scornful red-rimmed eyes to his and added, ‘I suppose it beats working for a living.’

A look she couldn’t interpret crossed his face. It wasn’t guilt, but it should have been.

‘Perhaps we do not all have your strong moral integrity.’

The faint derision she heard in his voice brought an angry flush to Nell’s tear-stained face. ‘I’m not suggesting I’m perfect.’

Luiz looked at her, the red swollen eyes, the pink nose, and found himself thinking, Maybe not perfect, but awfully appealing. And not his type…even his grandmother had recognised this.

She sniffed and he experienced a sharp twinge of emotion. Refusing to recognise its source, he got abruptly to his feet and walked across to the table where the tea tray lay undisturbed.

‘Can I get something for you?’

‘You can get me Lucy, take me to her.’

He regarded her incredulously. ‘Now?’

‘Certainly now.’

He shook his head doubtfully. ‘You don’t look in any condition to go anywhere.’

‘Yeah, well, I’m terribly sorry I don’t reach your standard of airbrushed perfection, but we had a deal and I’ve done my bit, which, I have to tell you, has left a nasty taste in my mouth, so now it’s your turn. Do you actually even know where they are? If so just tell me. I’ll drive myself there—I have a car.’

The silence stretched. She was, he decided, more than capable of doing just that if he allowed her. The woman gave a new meaning to stubborn…or maybe, he conceded, she just had to keep going because if she stopped or slowed down she would feel. The grief would come crashing in. It was a coping mechanism that he recognised, he had used it after Rosa died. In his case it had taken the form of work and more work that had been viewed in some quarters as a lack of caring.

Not that Luiz had cared. Strange that back then he had been unconcerned what anyone thought, and now Nell’s assumption he was an avaricious scrounger felt like a slap in the face. It had been a warped sense of pride that had prevented him putting her right, warped because he had given her little reason to have a good opinion of him—a good opinion he still refused to accept he wanted.

‘The road, such as it is, is not good. Only a four-wheel drive or preferably a horse will get you there.’

‘I don’t ride a horse.’ But it was not difficult to see Luiz Santoro on one.

‘Then four-wheel drive it is.’

Nell gave a watery smile of relief. ‘You’ll take me?’

‘As you are clearly not fit to be let out alone—yes, I will.’

Nell let the inference she needed a keeper pass. She was just so relieved to actually be doing something and not standing around.

He glanced at the metallic banded watch on his wrist, screwed up his eyes as though making a mental calculation, and said, ‘I have some things to attend to, so we’ll say an hour’s time. In the meantime eat. I’ll send Sabina, who will show you where to go if you want to freshen up.’

His frowning scrutiny brought a self-conscious flush to Nell’s face. The last thing she wanted was to look in a mirror.

‘Who is Sabina?’ she began, but he had gone.

She did not have long to wait to find out as the Spanish woman appeared moments later carrying fresh coffee. Nell found her manner soothing as she explained in heavily accented but perfect English that she was the housekeeper.

A few sandwiches forced down, her caffeine levels topped up, her hair combed and her face washed, Nell felt a lot more like herself and able to cope…so long as she didn’t think of that kiss.

Luiz returned forty-five minutes later.

He had been to his grandmother’s sick room to explain he would be away for the rest of the day.

It was soon clear that his plan had gone even better than he had anticipated. His grandmother had been more animated than he had seen her in many weeks.

Listening to her talk about his English bride, and the grandchildren she looked forward to living long enough to see born, made him wonder if extricating himself from this fake betrothal should the need arise might not be as simple as he had predicted.

It was a problem of his own making and, ironically, one he sincerely hoped he would have to face. But though the future was still uncertain and he could not allow himself to hope, one thing was clear: Nell Frost had Doña Elena’s stamp of approval. Nell Frost, who was nowhere to be seen.

Luiz looked at the disturbed tray, and glanced around the room seeing no immediate signs of the blonde English girl. Noticing that the double doors that led into the library were wide open, he strolled through them and almost immediately found her, perched on the top steps of one of the ladders that gave access to the topmost shelves that lined the room.

Lost in a book, she did not notice his entrance and Luiz did not immediately make her aware of his presence. Instead he paused—she made an aesthetically pleasing picture, the sun filtering through the wooden shutters that covered the south-facing library windows revealing not only the golden highlights in her hair, but a great deal of the slender curves beneath the cotton dress that it rendered virtually transparent.

His response to the image was more earthy than aesthetic.

Irritated, he had to make a conscious effort to put his libido back in its box. There was a time and a place for such indulgences and this was neither… It seemed a good moment to remind himself that she was not even his type!

He liked tall, athletically built women and she barely reached his shoulder, he recalled as his glance slid down her slim bare legs.

His hooded lids came down. Not close to his type, he reminded himself.

‘A busman’s holiday?’

She jumped at the sound of his voice and slid the dusty tome balanced on her knee into the vacant space on the top shelf. She did it with the care such a rare treasure deserved, which gave her the time to gather the wits that had gone walkabout the moment she had heard his voice.

She cleared her throat and pitched her voice at a cool level, ignoring the shivery tremors in her stomach as she told him, ‘I was looking at your books.’ The book she had extracted had been the only one Nell felt able to touch without protective gloves and yet still would have been counted a gem in many collections.

Did he know, she wondered, just how many rare and precious books this room held?

‘Could you not have looked at them on ground level?’

Nell ignored the question. ‘Do you realise that there is no system here at all?’

His brows rose at the admonitory heat in her voice.

‘There are some incredibly rare books here.’

‘And it’s a great shame they belong to an unappreciative philistine?’

‘You said it.’

‘I believe my great-grandfather was something of a collector.’ Over the years he had suggested to his grandmother that the collection be catalogued, but she had considered the project a costly waste of money.

Nell’s indignation flared. That someone so uninformed should have access to such a treasure seemed sacrilege.

‘Well, he’ll be turning in his grave right now because the condition of some…’ She made a clicking noise of disapproval with her tongue and shook her head. ‘Actually it’s criminal. There are some incredibly rare—’

Luiz’s amused drawl cut across her animated protest. ‘I have rarely seen a woman display such passion for anything unless it is a designer handbag.’

Nell couldn’t let the sexist comment pass unchallenged. ‘Really, if the women you know only get excited by handbags it speaks volumes for your skill in bed, and,’ she added, thinking of her limited collection at home, ‘you probably know more about designer handbags than I do.’

Her satisfaction at delivering the cutting comeback lasted for the two seconds it took her brain to supply an image of tumbled sheets and entwined limbs, fair skin looking very pale against the dark.

It had been clearly a major error to introduce the subject of the bedroom when she was talking to this man. Nell squeezed her eyes tightly shut against the explicit mental images playing in her head.

‘I didn’t mean—’ To mentally undress you.

‘To issue a challenge?’

She opened her mouth to protest but before she could offer a hasty placatory reply he added, ‘Or cast a slur on my masculinity…’ There was something mingled with the sardonic amusement that sent a shivery surge of sensation along her nerve endings. In her eagerness to deny the suggestion Nell almost fell off her perch as she shook her head vigorously in horrified denial.

‘Be careful!’

His sharp warning echoed the voice in her own head, though the voice in her head was not so worried about falling off the ladder as the knot of excitement pulsing low in her belly!

Good God, Nell, get a grip, girl! This is what happens when you don’t have a life. You step outside your comfort zone and the first OK male you see makes your hormones go haywire.

Nell’s darting eyes connected for a split second with the dark gleaming gaze of the man below and a small sigh of alarm left her lips as adrenaline and desire surged through her. She drew back, her brows knitting in consternation as she shuffled her bottom back along the top step until she could feel the spines of the books dig into her back.

All right, better than OK.

She took a couple of calming deep breaths and injected a note of amusement into her voice as she leaned forward, her hair swinging like a bell around her face.

‘Truth told, I’m more interested in finding Lucy than exploring your male insecurities.’

‘Don’t worry, I’m not that insecure.’

That was the problem, she thought.

‘Are you planning on coming down from there any time soon?’

In response to the question Nell gave a small shriek, drawn from her lips as her foot slipped. ‘Oops,’ she said as she grabbed at the rail to steady herself.

Below her she heard him growl something in husky Spanish that didn’t sound polite—not polite but very sexy. She made the rest of her descent more carefully until three steps from the ground a pair of big hands spanned her waist.

‘What do you think you’re doing?’ Set safely on the floor, she spun around pink-cheeked and indignant.

‘Preventing a potential accident.’

The cool explanation drew a derisive snort from Nell, or it would have if her choppy breathing had allowed anything but a faint sigh to emerge from her parted lips.

‘You shouldn’t climb ladders, Miss Frost, if you have no head for heights.’

Very conscious that his hands were still resting lightly on her waist, Nell lifted her chin and brushed a shiny skein of hair from her face.

To her intense relief Luiz’s hands fell away, but he was still standing close enough for her to feel the heat from his lean body.

‘Actually I have no problem with heights.’ Tall Spaniards with fallen angel faces were another matter.

She struggled to tear her eyes from the sternly sensual outline of his wide mobile mouth and cleared her throat as she recalled his kiss.

‘It’s these shoes.’ She glanced down at her sensible shoes and Luiz followed the direction of her gaze. ‘The soles have no grip.’

More of a grip than she had, she reflected with a small grimace of self-disgust. It was a struggle to keep focused and concentrate. Her mind kept drifting off on dangerous tangents.

And you’re not the sort of girl who has sexual fantasies, she reminded herself as she felt his steadying hand on her arm.

‘You have very small feet.’ Luiz’s glance lifted, the distracted expression she saw in his eyes vanishing as he scanned her face and added in an accusing manner, ‘Are you all right?’

She kept her eyes trained on the floor and lied through her teeth. ‘Fine.’ So the man was sexy—it wasn’t as if she had some sort of uncontrollable sex drive.

Luiz watched as a warm tide of colour rose up her slender neck until her face was aglow with colour. Moments earlier she had been deadly pale. ‘You don’t look fine.’

Her chin came up, though she continued to dodge his gaze, studying a point over his left shoulder.

‘I can’t help the way I look.’

And he, Luiz realised with a sense of shock, could not help liking the ways she looked—a lot. He had not wanted more than sex from a woman in a long time, to do so now with a woman he barely knew felt like a betrayal to Rosa’s memory. Not that there could be a comparison with his feelings now. Rosa had known him inside out and he her, they had grown up together and their bond had grown and blossomed.

‘Well, are you ready?’

Nell responded to the grouchy enquiry with a robust reminder that she was the one who had been waiting.

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