The Twelve-Month Marriage Deal. Margaret Mayo
with a heat that threatened to overcome him.
‘Exactly,’ she retorted sharply. ‘You’ve changed, I’ve changed. Is it so remarkable?’
‘I almost didn’t recognise you.’ He wasn’t going to tell her that he had failed to do so. Oh, no. He had no intention of putting himself down in her eyes. ‘May I be permitted to say that the transformation is sensational?’
He didn’t let his eyes move from hers. Just listening to her voice caused an ache in his gut. It was soft and lilting, like the finest music. Infierno, this woman was sending threads of temptation through every fibre of his body. He had never met anyone who had ignited his fire so suddenly and so thoroughly.
‘Thank you, kind sir.’
It was a mocking comeback and it didn’t please him. ‘I hear you’re on a rare visit to your family.’
‘Rare?’ Her back stiffened and she stood just that little bit taller. ‘Just because you and I haven’t bumped into each other, doesn’t mean that I don’t come home often.’
‘But not as often as you should.’ Cold grey eyes looked into hers. ‘What I’d like to know is why you felt the need to move to America in the first place. Doesn’t life here satisfy you? According to your sister, your parents were heartbroken, and I can perfectly understand why. Maybe they didn’t say anything to you. You saw it as an adventure, but they felt that you were turning your back on them.’
‘How do you know what they felt? How dare you criticise me?’ she shot back, her eyes hotter than ever. ‘What I do is none of your business. I’d like to say it’s been nice speaking to you, Vidal, but I’m afraid it hasn’t. If you have nothing kind to say to me then it’s best we don’t speak at all.’ And she began to walk away.
In an instant he caught her arm. ‘Elena, we have a lot to catch up on.’ His whole body went up in flames as he crushed her enticing body close to his, felt those long, sensuous limbs slide agonisingly against his more powerful ones, experienced the torment of her amazing breasts pressed into his chest.
‘Do we?’ she asked coldly. ‘I don’t blame my sister for walking out on you. You’re an arrogant swine who’s poking his nose into something that doesn’t concern him.’ Tugging herself free, and with a final condemning glare, she marched away.
He had no choice but to let her go, not if he didn’t want to create a scene. But his eyes followed her, watched the swing of her hips, the long graceful movement of her legs, half expecting her to glance back over her shoulder. She did not disappoint. And he met her eyes head on.
Such beautiful eyes, sloe shaped and a rich, dark golden-brown, fringed by long, thick, black lashes. There was a curious mixture of hauteur and interest in the way she looked at him and he allowed himself to smile faintly. Have no fear, Elena Benitez Valero, you’ll never walk away from me again.
To think that he had almost married Reina!
The thought hit him hard as he got ready for bed later that night. He had not spoken to Elena again, but he had watched every movement she made, saw the ease with which she talked to almost everyone present, flirting outrageously with the young men sitting either side of her at the dinner table.
He had also noticed the way that she carefully avoided looking at him and was grimly amused. Perhaps it meant that she too had felt a spark ready to ignite? Could it be that beneath the arrogance she was Miss Fire and Brimstone? His body hardened at the thought of getting to know her—intimately. Very intimately.
When he had agreed to marry her elder sister it had merely been a convenient partnership to form the merger of their banks. Reina had been willing and no one except themselves, his brother and their parents had been aware that it was not a love match.
But recently Reina had begun to have doubts. She wanted a real marriage, she said, she wanted to fall in love and live the fairy-tale dream. So he had done the honourable thing and released her from their engagement. Naturally, for Reina’s sake, he had let everyone believe that they had fallen out, and he had seen no reason why he should not still help her parents.
In fact, he had been ready to put things into motion—until tonight when he met Elena!
In an instant he’d had a dramatic change of heart. Elena would fit the bill as his wife perfectly. He had only to think of her delectable body, those fantastic breasts cupped in his hands, her incredibly long legs wrapped around him and those plump, delicious lips pressed hard against his, to know that he wouldn’t be satisfied until he had her in his bed.
He had made up his mind.
No Elena, no merger.
He knew how worried her parents must be. They had no idea yet that he had been thinking of going ahead with the merger regardless of his marriage to Reina. Maybe this was the reason Elena was here. Maybe they were trying to persuade her to take her sister’s place!
The thought brought a smile to his lips.
All he had to do now was sit back and wait.
Or maybe use a little light persuasion!
Elena wouldn’t agree to it straight away, he was aware of that. She wouldn’t worry whether her parents’ bank prospered or sank. She had turned her back on them. Goodness knew what she got up to in America. He didn’t know and he didn’t care.
Regardless, she was a stunning woman now and all he wanted was her beside him—every night.
Vidal went to sleep with a smile on his face.
Having met with Vidal again Elena was even more convinced that marriage to him was out of the question. He had changed almost beyond recognition. Gone was the young man she remembered. This man oozed sophistication. It crept out of his pores like an unwanted drug. His thick, dark hair, which had always refused to be tamed, now sat sleekly on his well-moulded head. And his powerful body suggested hours spent in a gym.
His eyes hadn’t changed; they were still a startling grey and actually rather attractive. It was his arrogance that really annoyed her. He might be the president of El Banco de Marquez, but his manners and his attitude towards her had certainly not improved.
She had known he was watching her across the room; she had felt his eyes on her the whole evening. It had sent cold shivers down her spine and a resurrection of the dislike she had felt for him when she was younger.
But what she hadn’t expected was the way he had greeted her. Little girl indeed! Was that how he still saw her? Admittedly he had tempered his comment by saying she had grown up sensationally—but she guessed that was designed to make himself look good.
And his suggestion that she wasn’t being fair on her parents had really got her back up. She rang them every day, for pity’s sake, and visited as often as she could. They had never uttered one word of reproach and had always insisted that they were proud of her for making something of her life.
It was why she couldn’t understand why they wanted her to give it up to marry Vidal.
What sort of a marriage would it be when he still treated her as Reina’s baby sister? He would never accept that she had grown up, or that she was a successful businesswoman in her own right. She couldn’t imagine anything worse than being married to him. He might have grown more handsome, staggeringly so. And he most definitely looked the part of one of the richest men in Spain. But as for anything else…
Chapter Two
‘I FEAR I’m wasting your time—as well as my own.’ Elena’s chin was high, her eyes fiercely defiant. Vidal had telephoned almost before she had got out of bed this morning and said that they needed to talk—so here they were in a tiny restaurant tucked away in the back streets of Seville having breakfast, and she had scared herself to death by feeling an unexpected and extremely scary response to him.
He wore a different cologne from last night, something light and musky and intensely sexy. And he looked as fresh as if he had had