‘I think you have some decisions to make about how you live your life, Holly. Success is great, but—’
Ruiz’s shrug said it all.
‘I need to get some sleep,’ he said, turning. Before he made the long journey back to Argentina, Holly guessed, as the man she loved and his dog left her life without a backward glance.
He didn’t sleep. Luckily for him he’d packed for the trip ahead of time. He tossed and turned, thinking about life and what he wanted out of it, and he came up with the same answer every time: Holly. She was all he wanted. He couldn’t make sense of his longing for her, or come up with anything more concrete than the fact that his life was empty without her. He wanted her, not just for a fling, but for longer—for ever, maybe. He’d started to get to know her and he wanted to know more. A lot more. He wanted to give them a chance. He wanted to run with the crazy redhead and see where it led. Almost certainly nowhere, Ruiz concluded, since Holly seemed completely wrapped up in her career. But was that because she really didn’t care about anything apart from her job. Or did Holly’s lack of confidence in her personal life mean she only felt safe when living vicariously through her column? There was only one way to find out.
If the team leader wanted misery he could have it, Holly reflected the next morning as she hung up her coat at the office. The only consolation was that she wasn’t alone with her hangdog expression. Everyone was a little under par after the party, moving in slow-mo and speaking in mumbles, and then only when necessary. But all that changed when she reached her desk. ‘What?’ she said, looking at the mob surrounding it. ‘What’s happened?’
As her colleagues peeled away from Holly’s work station Holly saw the envelope propped against the monitor. She knew immediately who it was from. Thousands of letters arrived each week addressed to The Redhead, but this was addressed in bold, black script, To Holly.
‘Well? Open it,’ Freya insisted.
Picking it up, Holly held the envelope to her chest almost as if she hoped that would make it invisible. ‘This is private,’ she said, hoping everyone would go away.
‘Open it here,’ Holly’s team leader insisted with his usual insensitivity. ‘Then if it’s anything to upset you, one of us can take over your work so at least something will get done today.’
‘He’s all heart,’ one of the girls murmured discreetly, adding, ‘We’re all on your side, Holly. And judging by the size of that envelope there could be something more inside it than just a private note.’
And why should she care if it was from Ruiz? Holly reasoned. He’d made it clear enough last night that what he wanted was a clean break. Perhaps she’d left something behind in the club and he was returning it, though she couldn’t remembering doing so—
‘It’s a folder from an airline,’ Freya informed her colleagues as Holly peered inside the envelope. ‘And there’s something else,’ she exclaimed, poring over Holly’s shoulder.
‘Do you mind?’ Holly said shakily. Walking over to the window, she turned her back on everyone. She read the handwritten note first. It was another of Ruiz’s succinct wake-up-calls: ‘Have you thought about your life yet, Holly? About who you really want to be? Maybe the enclosed will help. Ruiz.’
‘Are you okay, Holly?’ Freya demanded when she remained rooted to the spot. ‘Have you checked the airline tickets yet?’
Airline tickets, Holly thought numbly, turning her attention to the rest of the envelope’s contents. ‘Oh, my God! This is ridiculous—’
‘What is?’ Holly’s team leader demanded.
‘First-class return tickets to Buenos Aires, leaving tonight. And a VIP pass to a polo match.’ Holly held them up as if she needed everyone else to confirm that they were real. When the shrieks of excitement died down, she shook her head. ‘What a waste.’
‘A waste?’ her team leader queried sharply.
‘Well, I won’t be using them.’ Going back to her desk, Holly sank weakly into her chair. ‘How can I, when I’ve got so much work on here?’
‘Have laptop, will travel,’ the team leader argued briskly, swinging his chair round. ‘You can send copy from anywhere in the world with Internet access, Holly. And if you don’t take up that offer, you can consider yourself fired.’
‘Fired?’ Holly exclaimed, springing up.
‘Wasn’t it you who told me that the “Living with a Playboy” feature had almost run its course?’ her boss reminded her. ‘Don’t you think this trip to Argentina is the key to reviving it?’
And put her life through the wringer again? Did she want that? Wouldn’t it be so much easier to make it all up in the column as she went along and walk away from this? ‘I can’t afford to take time off,’ she said flatly.
‘We’ll cover your expenses and pay your wages while you’re away, as long as you keep submitting the column,’ the team leader said, growing in enthusiasm as he thought through his idea. ‘You’ve just been appointed ROCK!’s foreign correspondent. Just think what that will do for reader figures,’ he added, rubbing his hands with glee.
Reader figures. Great. But she felt empty inside. What was wrong with her? She finally had the career she’d always wanted.
And what a hollow victory that had turned out to be. What about the guy? What about Ruiz?
The thought of seeing Ruiz again was a terrifying and uncertain prospect. She didn’t know what to expect. Could she do it? Could she be with Ruiz again, write about him, and remain aloof? ‘What about me?’ she blurted as desperation took over.
‘What about you?’ the team leader demanded. ‘You’re part of a team, Holly. The clue’s in the word.’
He was right, Holly realised. She couldn’t let the team down—all of their jobs were on the line, not just hers. And nothing was ever achieved by hiding away. She had to get out there and confront life—and Ruiz—head-on.
‘I don’t know what you’re standing there for,’ he added impatiently. ‘Shouldn’t you be going back home to pack? According to this ticket you’ve got four hours to catch your flight!’
CHAPTER TEN
Hope I can read my writing later with all the turbulence—this must be the messiest diary entry I’ve made in a while.
Did I have any option but to accept Ruiz’s invitation? Having already messed up my non-existent love life, can I afford to risk my job as well? And then I have to ask myself this: If I can’t trust myself to take a professional approach and write an article about the playboy without wailing, what kind of journalist am I going to make?
So here I am after a thirteen hour flight, taxiing towards the stand at Aeropuerto Ministro Pistarini airport, more commonly known as Ezeiza after the city close to Buenos Aires in which the airport is situated. Did you hear that? Buenos Aires! Where the weather, according to our hip young captain, is a bikini-basting twenty-eight degrees. Before you get excited, he wasn’t directing that comment at me. With my red hair and freckles I don’t feel a bit out of place amongst all the sultry whip-thin señoritas seated here with me in First Class. As if! I feel more like a suet dumpling than ever—a fact no doubt observed by said captain when he took the precaution of performing a talent-trawl in the First Class cabin before lowering his landing gear. But I will be spending Christmas with the playboy at his family’s fabulous country-sized estancia and no one else can say that. I think you’ll agree this takes ‘Living with a Playboy’ to a whole new level. Buckle your seat belts, my friends; something tells me we’re in for a bumpy ride.
THE first thing Holly saw in the terminal building was a huge poster advertising the polo match featuring the Band of Brothers. Ruiz Acosta, ten times life size and easily the best looking of four astonishingly handsome brothers, staring down at her. She swallowed deeply. Everywhere she looked there seemed to be another poster—another heart-stopping reminder of the darkly glittering glamour that had so easily attracted her. Even the limousine Ruiz had sent to collect her had a Band of Brothers sticker on the back window. A crowd had gathered round to stare and comment and
swoon, and by the time she had collapsed onto the back seat her heart was thundering like a pack of wild mustangs.
Surely, this had to be a dream …
But it wasn’t a dream, and as the luxury vehicle ate up the dusty miles between the airport and the Acosta family’s estancia Holly felt her throat grow increasingly tight. Her anxiety wasn’t eased by the sight of numerous billboards advertising the match. Ruiz was a national hero it seemed. But how could this swarthy, dangerous-looking man with his burning stare, earring and tattoos be the same man who had held her in his arms and made love to her—
Forget that. Forget him. You’re here to do your job, that’s it.
She couldn’t think of anything but Ruiz. Even this harsh land was right for him. London, with all its neatly packaged districts, felt a lifetime away as the driver took her deeper into the interior. She had been commissioned to write an article and nothing more, Holly reasoned, trying to calm down: ‘Christmas with the Playboy’. She would also have the chance to watch Ruiz play polo, to see this rugged man with his thighs wrapped around the flanks of some prime horseflesh.
‘The game will have started by the time we arrive,’ the driver informed her. ‘But you’ll see plenty of it,’ he assured her in heavily accented English. ‘That’s if there’s anyone left alive on the field for you to watch by the time we get there.’
He laughed. She didn’t laugh.
Another colossal billboard loomed in front of them like a vivid punctuation mark amidst miles of arid scrubland that seemed to mock her with just how far she was from civilisation and any form of escape. She stared blindly out of the window. What was she doing here? Why had she come? She could have refused.
She should have refused.
And lost her job?
A road that had been deserted for hours was suddenly clogged with vehicles all travelling in the same direction. Hundreds more were already parked up on the roadside and in lines across the fields. Holly gasped with alarm when her driver, using the simple avoidance tactic of pulling onto the wrong side of the road, overtook everything at speed. With a final thump on his horn to warn the other vehicles, he swung the wheel and steered the limousine beneath an impressive archway that led to an immaculately groomed drive lined with trees. ‘Welcome to Estancia Acosta, Señorita Valiant,’ he said, continuing to drive at a speed that had the crowds spraying to either side on the road ahead of them. ‘I’m going to take you straight round to the pony lines where you will find Ruiz, if he isn’t on the polo field.’
‘I’ll be fine here. You can drop me anywhere.’ But preferably not beneath this billboard, Holly thought anxiously as they drove through what looked more like a very busy small town than a family ranch.
‘You might get lost if I leave you here,’ the driver insisted. ‘And then I’d be in trouble.’
With whom? she wondered. With Ruiz?
‘My orders are quite specific,’ the driver went on. ‘This is the most popular event of the year.’
It looked like it, and she was thrilled to see real gauchos, the Argentine equivalent of a cowboy, for the first time. Leather chaps to protect their breeches were held up by coin-decorated belts, while their hats were festooned with bands and laces. There were socialites too—the girls as immaculately groomed as the flashy polo ponies they had come to see. While I am more your sturdy hunter, Holly thought wryly. But then she was hunting for a story, not a husband.
But that didn’t stop her finger-combing her hair as the driver started to slow the car. They were approaching the pony lines now. Mashing her lips together, she decided against lipstick because her hands were shaking too much to put it on. She couldn’t see the polo field as it was hidden by the towering stands, but polo players were stalking about like muscular gods of the game. They wore white, jean-style breeches and either black shirts with a skull and cross-bones embroidered on the pocket, or ‘Acosta’ emblazoned in white in capital letters on the back of red shirts. Some of the players were already mounted with their faceguards down, their dark eyes shielded behind stylish eye-protectors, but so far there was no sign of Ruiz.
‘He must be playing,’ the driver said as a cheer went up somewhere out of sight. ‘These men are the reserves—warming up and standing ready in case of injury.’
Holly’s stomach lurched at the thought of Ruiz being injured.
‘Shall I take you to see him play?’
‘Would you?’ she said gratefully, though the thought terrified her at the same time.
The stands were vast and impressive and ran the length of the field, which was about six times the size of a football pitch and packed to the rafters with noisy supporters. Seats had been reserved for them on the front row and as she sat down Holly’s gaze instantly locked onto Ruiz. She’d have known that muscular body anywhere, though she had never seen it at full stretch like this. As he thundered past the stand in a blur of red top, and white mud-streaked breeches, she felt a reckless punch of full-blown lust. Ruiz’s face guard was down, but she didn’t need to see his eyes to know that he was on a mission and everyone had better keep out of his way. The romantic idea of polo was one thing, but seeing Ruiz’s superb horsemanship firsthand, along with his tactical expertise and sheer physical courage, made it impossible to keep her thoughts confined to business. She was ashamed to admit, even to herself, how much she wanted him.
No, she didn’t, Holly told herself firmly, turning like the rest of the crowd to watch Ruiz. She wasn’t going there. She was a professional journalist with a job to do. Ruiz had stopped abruptly at one end of the field. Turning his horse, he charged the pack at a gallop, mallet raised. Leaning at such an acute angle, he seemed to defy gravity as he deftly hooked the ball and smacked it down the field. The crowd went wild as the band of brothers closed ranks behind him. Everyone sprang to their feet, screaming encouragement as Ruiz swung his mallet a second time and scored a goal. Forgetting herself, Holly screamed hysterically with the rest.
‘What a man,’ the woman next to her exclaimed, fanning herself with her hand. ‘What wouldn’t I give to spend the night with him?’
So that was why she had come to Argentina, Holly thought wryly.
No, it wasn’t!
‘Ruiz stole that ball from the great Nero Caracas,’ the driver on her other side was explaining to her excitedly. ‘Ruiz’s brother Nacho Acosta and Nero Caracas are considered to be the top players in the world.’
‘And yet Ruiz got the better of him,’ Holly agreed with pride. Oh, yes, he did.
She watched Ruiz settle back into the saddle and take easy control of his horse as the two teams cantered down the field to change ends after his goal. He was so relaxed, so sexy. The excitement of the match had made her forget how nervous she had been at the prospect of seeing him again, but now the butterflies were back. What would a man like that think of a distinctly unglamorous, planerumpled Holly Valiant? Would he sigh heavily, and wonder why on earth she had agreed to come to Argentina? Ruiz must know why she had accepted. The public reason was that she had no option if she didn’t want to lose her job. The private reason was hers alone.
She sat tensely as the match started up again. The camaraderie between Ruiz and his infamous brothers was obvious, as was the strong bond between them. The way he praised his horse touched her, just as the quiet confidence on his ruthless face made Ruiz even more attractive. She envied him for belonging so strongly to something and somewhere, and having the family bond she had always hankered after. How wonderful for Lucia to have grown up under the protection of brothers like that, she thought briefly, but then she added wryly, how terrible. With four warriors watching over her it was no wonder Lucia Acosta had felt the need to break away. The Acosta brothers were such a formidable force it would be easy to be eclipsed by them.
When the match had been declared a draw and the players awarded their medals, they cantered off the field. Holly felt weak with longing, and tense with anticipation at the thought of this first meeting. She left her seat to go and fi
nd Ruiz. The teams were coming into the yard by the time she arrived, steel horseshoes clattering across the cobbles. The men made quite a sight—all of them muscular and rugged, with shoulders wide enough to carry an ox. She stood beneath the shade of some trees, watching discreetly as the men chatted to each other as if they hadn’t been mortal enemies only minutes before. Ruiz had his mallet resting on his massive shoulders, and was holding the reins casually in one hand. He was so achingly familiar, and yet a stranger in so many ways. Thinking herself hidden in the shadows she exclaimed out loud when he looked straight at her and came cantering over.
‘Welcome to Argentina, Holly Valiant,’ he said.
She gasped with surprise when he dipped out of the saddle to kiss her cheek. ‘I’m glad you decided to accept my invitation,’ he said, staring down at her with all the knowledge and humour in his eyes she remembered.
She hoped she mumbled something vaguely polite in return as Ruiz sprang down from the saddle. Handing over his sweating pony and mallet to a waiting groom, he turned to face her. ‘Did you enjoy the match?’ Her heart thundered in response as Ruiz removed his helmet and ran one hand through his wild black hair.
‘It was fantastic. You were fantastic …’ Her voice tailed away. She felt incredibly self-conscious all of a sudden, and realised that Ruiz must receive such unsophisticated compliments all the time.
‘I’m glad you enjoyed it,’ he said, a sincere smile planting an attractive crease in his cheek. ‘Did you see my goal?’
‘Yes, I saw it,’ she confirmed, realising that even national heroes needed reassurance from time to time. ‘It was brilliant.’ And now she was smiling. How could she not smile when Ruiz was around? She had lost the art of playing it cool where Ruiz Acosta was concerned—if she had ever had it in the first place.
Ruiz’s massive shoulders eased in a self-deprecating shrug as he glanced after his horse. ‘I owe it all to my pony. I saved my best horse until the last chukka.’
The Shameless Life of Ruiz Acosta Page 12
