As she stood up, Raul zipped her dress for her. She was conscious of her body’s decided tenderness, the result of their frantic lovemaking. He was oversexed, as well as careless, but she still loved him to death. Otherwise she probably would have killed him at that moment for simply dropping on her this late in the day the fact that they were entertaining guests.
‘Who’s coming?’ she asked, balancing to slide into her second shoe.
‘Melina D’Agnolo and—’ A firm hand snaked out swiftly to steady her as she staggered on one leg and nearlywent headlong down the slope. ‘Dios mio, mi esposa…take care!’ Raul urged.
‘You were saying?’ Her head bent to conceal her shock, Polly breathed in very shakily.
‘Melina, our closest neighbour,’ Raul shared, with what Polly considered to be megawatt cool. ‘She grew up on the ranch she’s currently renting from the estate. She’s bringing the Drydons—mutual friends. Patrick will join us. He used to work for Rob Drydon.’
‘I’ll enjoy meeting them.’ Polly sneaked a glance at Raul to see if he looked even slightly self-conscious. He didn’t
Raul swept up the hamper and even joked about the fact that they had eaten nothing. They strolled back to the car. Raul helped her into the passenger seat
‘I’m a brute,’ he murmured, scanning the bluish shadows of tiredness under her eyes. ‘But it was fantastic, es ver-dad?’
Melina was a neighbour. The llanos looked empty for miles and miles, but they harboured the poisonous Melina somewhere close by. It was ghastly news. Worse, Raul expected her to entertain his ex-mistress. He was cooler than an ice cube. But then he wasn’t aware that she knew about that former relationship. Former, she emphasised to herself with determination.
Raul was a sophisticated male and she was being naive. His intimate relationship with Melina D’Agnolo might be over, but that didn’t mean he would cut her out of his life altogether. She had to taken an adult view of this social encounter.
CHAPTER TEN
‘I AM so very pleased for you both,’ Melina murmured, with a look of deep sincerity in her green eyes as she reached for Polly’s hand in an open and friendly manner.
Dear heaven, she could act me off the stage, Polly registered in dismay, not having been prepared for quite so impressive a pretence. Stunning, in a black lace dress which clung to her superb figure like a second skin, Melina curved a light hand over Raul’s sleeve and recounted a witty little story which made him laugh.
Polly had been feeling really good in her scarlet off-the-shoulder dress—until just before she came downstairs. Now her head was aching. She hoped Melina’s pleasantries were more than surface-deep.
Rob Drydon and his wife, Susie, were from Texas, and eagerly talking horses with Patrick Gorman. As they transferred to the dining room Melina was in full flow of conversation with Raul, and Polly was left to trail behind them. Patrick caught up with her.
“The condesa will walk all over you if you let her,’ he whispered in her ear.
Polly’s eyes widened. She glanced up at him.
Patrick gave her a rueful look. ‘The scene she threw on your arrival was too good a story for the staff to keep quiet. I heard the grooms talking about it,’ he confided. ‘And as Raul needs the least protection of any male I know, why is he the only person around here who doesn’t know about the warm welcome you received?’
Polly tensed. ‘There wasn’t any need to involve him.’
‘If you’d involved Raul, she wouldn’t be here now, spoiling your evening,’ Patrick dropped gently. As Patrick tucked Polly into her chair at the foot of the table she encountered Raul’s level scrutiny, and found herself flushing without knowing why. Picking up her wine glass, she drank.
‘Raul told me to pick out a decent mount for you,’ Patrick shared chattily.
Polly’s wine went down the wrong way. She spluttered, cleared her throat, and gave her companion a pleading look. ‘Can you keep a secret, Patrick?’
He nodded.
Leaning her head guiltily close to his, Polly whispered, ‘I’m afraid I wasn’t entirely honest about my riding ability.’
Patrick frowned. ‘In what way?’
‘I’ve never been on a horse in my life.’
After a startled pause, Patrick burst out laughing.
‘Don’t be selfish,’ Raul drawled silkily. ‘Share the joke with the rest of us.’
Clashing with shimmering dark eyes, Polly flushed. ‘It wasn’t really funny enough.’
“The English sense of humour isn’t the same as ours,’ Melina remarked sweetly. ‘I’ve always found it rather juvenile.’
Patrick grinned. ‘I have to confess I’m not into your wildly dramatic soap operas. Each to his own.’
Under cover of the ensuing conversation, Patrick murmured, ‘See you tomorrow morning at six while Raul’s out riding. I’ll teach you enough to pass yourself, and then you can tell him you’re just not very good and he can take over.’
‘You’re a saviour,’ Polly muttered with real gratitude, and turned to address Rob Drydon.
After dinner, they settled down with drinks in the drawing room. Melina crossed the room with another one of her super-friendly smiles, saying in her clear, ringing voice, ‘I want you to tell me all about yourself, Polly.’
Sinking deep into the sofa, to show the maximum possible amount of her incredibly long and shapely legs, Melina asked, ‘So how’s married life treating you?’
‘Wonderfully well.’ Polly emptied her glass in one gulp and prayed for deliverance, uneasily conscious that Raul was watching them both from the other side of the room. She wished she was feeling more herself.
‘I don’t think Raul likes to see you drinking so much. He rarely touches alcohol…the occasional glass of champagne on important occasions.’ Registering Polly’s surprise, Melina elevated a brow. ‘So you didn’t know? How couldn’t you know something that basic about your own husband?’
Polly clutched her empty glass like a drunkard amongst teetotallers, bitterly, painfully resenting the fact that Melina could tell her anything she didn’t know about Raul. It reminded her all over again that until very recently there had been nothing normal about her relationship with Raul.
“That’s none of your business,’ she told Melina flatly, determined not to play the blonde’s spiteful double game. Now, when it was too late, she saw how foolish she had been not to tell Raul about her initial clash with Melina. If she tried to tell him now, he probably wouldn’t believe her, not with Melina putting on the show of the century with her smiling friendliness.
‘Raul is my business, and he always will be,’ Melina said smugly. ‘Did you make a huge scene when he came to see me that very same night?’
Polly froze and then slowly, jerkily turned her head, which was beginning to pound unpleasantly. ‘What are you saying?’
“That even I wasn’t expecting him quite that soon.’ Glinting green eyes absorbed Polly’s growing pallor with satisfaction. ‘I didn’t need ESP to realise that you’d obviously had a colossal row. It was your first night in your new home and yet Raul ended up with me.’
‘You’re lying.. .I don’t believe you.’ That night had been the equivalent of their wedding night Raul couldn’t have—he simply couldn’t have gone to Melina beforehand! But he had gone out riding. In sick desperation, she strained to recall what he had told her. Hadn’t he admitted calling in with a neighbour? Numbly, Polly let the maid refill her glass. Melina was a neighbour. Technically Raul hadn’t lied to her…
‘He came to me to talk. Raul needs a woman, not a little girl.’
Polly took a defiant slug of her drink. ‘He needs you like he needs a hole in the head!’ she said, and then frowned in confusion as Melina suddenly leant past her to start talking in low-pitched Spanish.
‘I hope you’re feeling better the next time I see you, Polly,’ Melina then murmured graciously as she rose to her feet.
An icy voice like a lethal weap
on breathed in Polly’s shrinking ear, ‘I’ll see our guests out, mi esposa. Don’t you dare get up. If you stand up, you might fall over, and if you fall over, I’ll put you under a very cold shower!’
Devastated to realise that Raul must have overheard her last response to Melina, and doubtless believed that she had been inexcusably rude for no good reason, Polly sat transfixed while everyone took their leave, loads of sympathetic looks and concerned murmurs coming her way once Raul mentioned that she was feeling dizzy.
Patrick hung back to say with a frown, ‘Do you think you’ll make it down to the stables in the morning?’
Polly nodded with determination.
Recalling how wonderfully close she and Raul had been earlier in the day, Polly began to droop. Had Raul been with Melina that night? Only a fool would believe anything Melina said, she decided. But a split second later she was thinking the worst again, imagining how easy, how tempting it would have been for Raul in the mood he had been in to seek consolation with his mistress, a beautiful, self-assured woman whom he had known for so many years…Two minutes later, Raul strode back in and scooped Polly off the sofa.
‘I’m so miserable!’ Polly suddenly sobbed in despair.
Taken aback, Raul tightened his arms around her and murmured what sounded like soothing things in Spanish.
‘And I haven’t had too much to drink…1 just feel awful!’ she wept, clutching at the lapel of his dinner jacket and then freeing him again, because she didn’t want to touch him, didn’t want to be close to him in any way if he was capable of such deception.
Raul carried her upstairs, laid her gently down on his bed and slipped off her shoes.
‘I’m in agony with a headache!’ Polly suddenly hurled.
‘You’re tipsy,’ Raul murmured with total conviction as he unzipped her dress.
‘My head’s so sore,’ Polly mumbled, drowning in self-pity.
Raul extracted her from her dress and deftly massaged her taut shoulders. ‘You’re so tense,’ he scolded. ‘Relax, I’ll get some painkillers.’
Hadn’t he heard what she had said to Melina after all? Had she jumped to conclusions? Surely he would have said something by now?
‘Why were you angry with me?’ she whispered.
‘You were flirting like mad with Patrick.’
‘I like him,’ Polly muttered, distracted by that unexpected response.
‘I know,’ Raul growled, in an undertone that set up a chain reaction down her sensitive spine as he undid her bra and deftly disposed of it ‘I didn’t realise you were feeling ill. I was surprised you were drinking so much.’
‘I knew I had a bad head when I came downstairs,’ Polly sighed, wriggling her way out of her tights at his behest. ‘I felt rotten.’
‘You should’ve told me,’ Raul purred. ‘Melina said you were talking about our annual fiesta here…were you?‘Polly tensed. ‘Don’t remember…my head was splitting. You seem to know her very well.’ ‘Inside out,’ Raul agreed silkily. ‘When did you invite Melina to dinner?’
The same evening I visited my grandfather. Fidelio is the foreman of the ranch Melina rents,’ Raul revealed.
‘Oh… Oh…’ Polly gasped slightly, slowly putting that together for herself.
Raul had called in with Fidelio that night to tell him he had a great-grandson. And that was why Raul had seen Melina. How silly she had been! And why hadn’t it occurred to her before now that at some point Raul would have had to see Melina face to face to inform her of his marriage? As she came to terms with that rational explanation, a giant tide of relief started rolling over her.
‘I’m awfully tired,’ she confessed.
Raul tugged her up against him and gently slotted her into the silky pyjama jacket he had fetched. He carefully rolled up the sleeves. ‘I have a villa on the coast. I think we should spend a few days there…’
‘Sounds good,’ Polly mumbled, and closed her eyes.
She slept like a log but she had the most terrifying dream. She was living in the house at the foot of the garden and Melina was queening it at the ranch. History repeating itself in reverse. She woke with a start, perspiring and shivering, just in time to see Raul reach the door in his riding gear.
‘What time is it?’
‘Only five-thirty…go back to sleep.’
Abruptly recalling the arrangement she had made with Patrick Gorman, Polly leapt out of bed the instant Raul closed the door behind him.
After a quick shower, she pulled on jeans and a T-shirt, frantic because she knew she was running late. She rushed down the corridor to see Luis, which was always the first thing she did in the morning. In the doorway of the nursery, she stopped dead in surprise and some dismay.Raul was lounging back in a chair with Luis lying asleep on top of him. Garbed in a little yellow sleepsuit and sprawled trustingly across his father’s muscular chest, their son looked impossibly small in comparison.
‘I thought you’d already left…’ Her voice drained away again, because all of a sudden she felt the weight of her silly deception. It hit her the instant she registered what going behind Raul’s back actually entailed.
Brilliant dark eyes veiled, Raul gave her a glinting smile that had the odd effect of increasing her discomfiture. ‘If you feed him, Luis is very appealing at this hour.’
‘You fed him yourself?’ Polly was astonished.
‘Since I woke him up by coming in, it didn’t seem fair not to. He went through that bottle like he hadn’t eaten in days!’ Raul confided, smoothing light fingers down over his son’s back as Luis snuffled and shifted his little froglike legs, content as only a baby with a full tummy can be. ‘His nursemaid changed him for me. He looks so fragile stripped, I didn’t want to run the risk of doing it myself.’
Polly reached down and stole Luis into her own arms, and lovingly rubbed her cheek against her son’s soft, sweet-smelling skin before she reluctantly tucked him back into his cot.
‘I gather the jeans mean you’ve finally decided to come out riding with me,’ Raul drawled from the door. ‘You won’t find those jeans very comfortable.. .but then I assume you already know that.’
Still leaning over the cot with her back turned to him, Polly’s jaw dropped.
‘You’re lucky I stopped off in here. You’d have missed me otherwise,’ Raul added casually.
Outside the silent house, Polly clambered into the four-wheel drive with a trapped look in her eyes.
‘It’s been ages and ages since I’ve been on a horse, Raul,’ she said, rather abruptly.
‘It’s a skill you never forget,’ Raul asserted bracingly.‘A couple of hours in the saddle and you’ll wonder how you ever lived without it.’
A couple of hours! Polly was aghast. Raul shot the vehicle to a halt at the side of the stables.
Patrick Gorman strolled out of the big tack room and then froze when he saw Raul.
‘I’m not accustomed to seeing you abroad at this hour, Patrick. Polly’s coming out with me this morning.’
‘I’ll be in the office if you want me.’ Without even risking a glance in Polly’s direction, Patrick strode off.
Polly stood like a graven image while a pair of grooms led out two mounts. El Lobo, Raul’s big black stallion, and a doe-eyed bay mare—who looked, somewhat reassuringly, barely awake.
Raul planted a hard hat on her head and did up the strap. Then he extended a peculiarly shaped garment that reminded her of an oversized body warmer.
‘Protection…since you mentioned being out of practice. If you take a toss, I don’t want you hurt.’ He fed her into the ugly bulky protector and deftly pushed home the clasps. It weighed her down like armour..
Sweeping her up, Raul settled her into the saddle, where she hunched in sudden complete terror.
‘I can’t ride… Raul, do you hear me? I can’t ride!’ Polly cried.
‘I know…’ Raul murmured, so softly she had to strain to hear him as he shortened the stirrups and slotted her feet into them.
‘I’d have to be a complete idiot not to know.’
‘You kn-know?’ Polly gasped in disbelief as he swung up on El Lobo with fluid ease.
‘Dios mio…how could I not guess? Your body language around the horses yesterday was not that of an experienced horsewoman. And I could hardly miss the fact that you hadn’t a clue what I was talking about,’ Raul delineated very drily.
Polly turned a dull red. ‘I thought you’d find it a complete bore if I admitted I was a greenhorn.‘His stunning dark golden eyes gleamed with grim amusement. ‘Are you really so naive about men? Is there any male who doesn’t relish imparting his superior knowledge of a subject to a woman?’
‘I told Patrick I couldn’t ride last night…he offered to take me through the basics this morning,’ she volunteered in an embarrassed rush. ‘It was stupid of me.’
In response, Raul shot her a chilling glance as piercing as an arrow of ice. His lean, strong face was hard. ‘Infierno! I suspected something of the sort last night. Let me tell you now that I do not expect my wife to make furtive assignations with my employees!’
‘It wasn’t an assign—’
‘And from now on you will ensure that you are never in Patrick Gorman’s company without the presence of a third party.’
Thoroughly taken aback, Polly exclaimed, ‘Don’t be ridiculous!’
His brilliant eyes flashed. ‘As your husband, I have the right to demand a certain standard of behaviour from you.’
Polly was outraged and mortified. ‘But you’re being totally unreasonable. “The presence of a third party”!’ she repeated in a fuming undertone of incredulity.
‘If you disobey me, I’ll dismiss him.’
Raul held her shaken eyes with fierce intensity, and then simply switched channels by telling her that she was sitting on the mare’s back like a seasick sack of potatoes. The riding lesson which followed stretched Polly’s self-discipline to the limits. She had to rise above that abrasive exchange and concentrate on his instructions, and Raul had high expectations.
Lynne Graham- Contract Baby Page 15
