“It’s a joke,” she’d insisted. “It’s not legally binding. A clause like that is absolute nonsense.”
“It isn’t that simple,” Thaddeus had said carefully. Marriage contracts, he explained, could be legal and binding. They were still in use in parts of the world, especially in royal families.
Alyssa had snorted with derision.
“I have news for you. We don’t sell human beings in America.”
“No one is selling a human being. I keep telling you, it’s—”
“A marriage contract. It’s still illegal. Tell Prince Felix I said so. And if he argues, tell him where he can shove that stipulation!”
“Read the contract before you make a decision, will you? It calls for the Reyes to restore the land and use it, in perpetuity, for ranching. Otherwise, the bank will seize it and you know what that means.”
She knew, all right. A local developer was panting for all these rolling acres, eager to turn them into soulless tracts of cheap housing.
It was a sobering realization. Losing her mother’s land was bad enough. Losing it to a developer was worse but being married off to a stranger…
“How could you have drawn up such a document?” she’d demanded.
Thaddeus admitted that he hadn’t. Prince Felix’s attorneys had done virtually all the legal work. He had done nothing but, in his words, crossed a few t’s and dotted a couple of i’s.
She was still groaning over that when he’d dropped the next bit of news.
Felix’s grandson, the prince who would permit his grandfather to buy him a bride, was on his way to finalize arrangements.
“He’s not finalizing anything!”
“The contract exists, Alyssa. I’m afraid there’s little I can do.”
“You can change it. Research it. Find precedents we can use to break it. I’ll do the same. Damn it, I had a year of law school. I know there’s not a contract written that can’t be broken. How come you don’t know that, too?”
“Read the contract,” Thaddeus had repeated wearily.
So she’d read it. And the more she’d read, the more she’d seen just how cleverly the Reyes’s lawyers had been in their use of language and tort law.
The contract seemed unassailable.
She’d sent Prince Felix a letter, demanding he forget the stipulation. She hadn’t received an answer. She’d figured that meant the Spanish prince would not be dissuaded from coming to the ranch. Why? Was it to try to hold her to the contract terms? Did he actually think he could do that? Most of all, why would he be willing to marry a woman he had never seen?
The only thing that made sense was that Lucas Reyes was the human equivalent of a toad.
Squat. Bloated, with constant drool falling from fleshy lips. Ugly enough to frighten small children. Or tall. Skinny as a scarecrow, with ears that stood out from his head. After a couple of days, she’d decided he probably had warts, too.
And then she and Bebé had come within an inch of riding down a stranger. A tall, dark-haired, hot-eyed, gorgeous stranger…
The Spanish prince. And he had no idea who she was, or the real reason he was here. He honestly thought he’d come to look at a mare.
In reality, he’d come to look at her. Breeding stock, according to Aloysius.
Hadn’t he always described her in the terms horsemen used when talking about mares? It started when she turned sixteen. She had, he’d said, good bloodlines. Good conformation. She’d make someone a good wife. Someone with money, who could infuse life back into the ranch was what he’d meant, though nobody dared say it.
A couple of months later, Aloysius had sent her east to boarding school, then college. She’d come home when her mother took ill, went east again after her death—and returned for the last time when Aloysius was dying. An act of human decency, because it had seemed the right thing to do.
Now here she was, staring at the stud she was supposed to be bred to.
The man who’d bought her from Aloysius.
So much for human decency.
Okay. Lucas Reyes hadn’t bought her. He hadn’t even known about the deal. Whatever. It was still humiliating and once she knew his identity, thanks to George, she’d phoned Thaddeus and demanded he drive over and handle things. She would stand by and listen, but Thaddeus would do the talking.
Wrong.
Thaddeus had taken the coward’s way out. He’d tiptoed up to the truth, then lurched away from it so that she was stuck with the job. She’d have to explain why he was here to Lucas Reyes. It was horrible and demeaning and…
And, just look at the man. Look at His Mightiness. His jaw was trying its best to defy gravity.
He was—what was the word? Nonplussed. Alyssa wanted to laugh. His Mightiness, the Prince of NonPlussed. It didn’t even the score. She was still humiliated but at least he was completely bewildered.
How nice. How well-deserved.
He’d done a fine job of bewildering her this afternoon. Invading her space, forcing a confrontation…
Kissing her as if it was his right—but he probably thought it was. He was a prince, born to wealth and power and, okay, good looks.
Why not be honest?
Lucas Reyes was gorgeous.
Black hair. Hazel eyes. Strong jaw. A little dent in his nose that only heightened his sexiness.
He must have broken it sometime in the past.
A riding accident? Or an accident with a woman? It was nice to think some woman had given the prince her best shot.
The rest of the man was gorgeous, too. Long. Lean. Hard-muscled. When he’d kissed her she’d felt the masculine power of his body. The strength of it. When he’d kissed her…
God, when he’d kissed her…
Alyssa blinked. Lucas was looking at her with the intensity of a rattlesnake watching a field mouse.
It frightened her but she’d sooner have died than let him know it. She didn’t know much about men—why would she want to? What she’d learned, watching her mother defer to Aloysius, was enough. But she knew stallions and to show weakness to a stallion was to put yourself in mortal danger.
So she steeled herself for the Spanish prince’s inevitable questions and reminded herself that she’d had nothing to do with any of this, and he’d damned well better get that straight.
“Explain yourself.”
His voice was low and filled with command. Alyssa narrowed her eyes. The last time anyone had used that tone with her was in sixth grade and Miss Ellison had demanded to know why she’d punched Ted Marsden in the nose.
Because he thought he could get away with putting his hand on my backside, she’d said, and Miss Ellison had tried, unsuccessfully, not to laugh.
Nobody was laughing now.
Alyssa drew herself up. “Excuse me?”
“I said—”
“I heard what you said. I just didn’t like the way you said it.”
Lucas stepped forward. She managed to stand her ground but was that really better than tilting her head back so she could keep her eyes on his?
“It’s been a very long day, amada,” he said softly. “I am tired and irritable, I have not eaten since morning, and I am in no mood for nonsense.”
“I’m sorry if you find our hospitality lacking,” Alyssa said, her coolness making a mockery of the words, “but I am equally tired and irritable and, thanks to your presence, I have not eaten, either. Just knowing you were here spoiled my appetite.”
She gasped as his hands closed around her shoulders.
“You are quick to offer insult.”
“You are quick to show your temper.”
“I want answers.”
“And I want you gone. Perhaps, if we cooperate, we can both get what we want.”
Angry as he was, Lucas almost laughed. Dios, this one was tough! Not that she wasn’t frightened. Despite her show of bravado, he could feel her trembling under his hands.
Was she afraid of him?
He hoped not. She had angered him, y
es. Infuriated him, was closer to the truth, but he had no taste for scaring women, especially women with such deep blue eyes and sweet, tender mouths.
And look how quickly she’d taken his thoughts from where they belonged, he thought coldly.
Something was going on here, a scam, a swindle of some kind, and he was not going to let this woman, who was surely part of it, distract him.
“That’s the first intelligent thing you’ve said, señorita.” Lucas lifted his hands from her shoulders. “So, go on. Explain yourself. Oh. Sorry.” A smile that wasn’t a smile at all twisted his mouth. “What I meant,” he said dryly, “is, would you kindly tell me what you meant by that cryptic statement? In what way did my grandfather supposedly ‘buy’ you?”
Alyssa decided to ignore his sarcasm. It was time to get this over with.
“As Thaddeus told you, your grandfather and my adoptive father signed a contract. Felix paid Aloysius half the agreed-upon price.”
Lucas was watching her through narrowed eyes. “With the other half due when?”
“When the stipulation had been fulfilled.”
“There’s that word again.”
Alyssa swallowed. A moment ago, she’d been ready to explain. Now—God, now, she just wanted the floor to open up.
“Well? I’m waiting. What ‘stipulation’?”
“It’s—it’s…The stipulation involves—”
Her tongue felt as if it were glued to the roof of her mouth. How did you tell a man he was supposed to marry you?
“You see, Alyssa?” Thaddeus Norton’s plump face was flushed. “It isn’t that easy after all.”
The lawyer marched across the room to Lucas and held out the folder he’d taken from his briefcase. A couple of minutes out of the line of fire seemed to have restored his courage.
“Read it yourself, Your Highness. In the end, it’s simpler that way.”
Lucas nodded, took the folder, extracted a sheaf of papers from it, turned his back to the room and began to read.
Half an hour went by.
Then he swung toward the attorney.
“This is insane.”
“It’s a marriage contract.”
Lucas’s face darkened. “Do not provoke me, Norton.”
The lawyer’s few seconds of courage seemed to be over.
“I’m not trying to provoke you, sir,” he stammered, “I’m just stating the facts. That document—”
“Is a joke!” Lucas flung the pages on the desk and watched as they fluttered to the floor like dry leaves. “No one signs things like this anymore.”
Alyssa nodded. “I said that. I told Thaddeus—”
“You told Thaddeus,” Lucas said sharply. “Oh, I’ll just bet you did!” His eyes narrowed. “Or did you dictate this to him line by line? Did you dip back into the middle ages and come up with a document guaranteed to send me into orbit?”
“Me?” She moved toward him, eyes flashing. “You think I…? Let me tell you something, Mr. Reyes—”
“It’s Prince Reyes,” Lucas snarled. “Or Your Highness. Get it straight.”
“I had nothing to do with this, Your Mightiness. I didn’t even know about it. Do you really think—do you honestly think I’d want my name linked to yours, even on a piece of paper?” She stopped an inch from him, hand lifted, forefinger pointed at the center of his chest. “Never! You understand that, oh almighty potentate? Not in a million years. Not in a hundred million years. Not ever!”
Lucas knew how to stop the angry words flying from that pretty mouth. All he had to do was haul her close, bury his hands in her hair and kiss her.
And, Dios, he wanted to do it.
To watch her eyes fill with rage—and then watch them fill with desire.
Was he crazy? He’d just read a document full of where-ases and wherefores that boiled down to an arranged marriage between him and Alyssa Montero McDonough—that middle name made sense, he thought crazily, all that heat and smoldering fury—he’d just discovered his beloved, conniving, scheming, possibly senile grandfather had pledged his name and his fortune to a Texas wildcat, and he wanted to kiss her?
Like hell he did.
What he wanted was to get out of this madhouse. Not tomorrow. Right now.
“This,” he said, “is getting us nowhere.”
“A brilliant conclusion.”
He shot her a look. “Do not push me,” he said softly.
She started to speak, then obviously thought better of it. The woman wasn’t a fool.
“I’m sure you and Norton thought this was very clever. I’m not sure how you managed it, how, exactly, you got my grandfather to sign this—this bit of legal mumbo jumbo—”
“Me?” Alyssa huffed. “Me? I didn’t have a damned thing to do with it!”
“I had little to do with it, sir,” Norton said, the words tumbling from his lips in a rush. “Your grandfather’s attorneys did most of the work, then sent the papers to me, after which my client signed it in front of a notary and we sent it to Spain by messenger so that your grandfather could sign it, too, and then—”
Lucas pounded his fist on the desk again. By the end of this charade, he thought grimly, the damned thing would be fit for firewood.
“I have no interest in the back-and-forth steps, Norton! I’m talking about…” What was the phrase? Lucas had spent four years at Yale; he had a condo in New York. America was his second home but right now, his English was failing him. “I’m talking about the setup. The preparation you and McDonough and the charming Miss McDonough put into this—this sting.”
“Sting?” Alyssa shot forward. This time, her finger almost poked a hole in his chest. “Your grandfather gets together with my father and they agree to—to sell me to you and you accuse me of a sting?”
She gasped as Lucas caught her wrist and yanked her arm behind her back. The action brought her to her toes. Brought her body suddenly against his.
His response was instantaneous. Just the feel of her, the soft fragrance of her, and he hardened like stone. Her eyes widened in pretended innocence until they were big enough to swallow him whole.
“Isn’t my reaction the desired effect, amada?” he said, so softly that only she would hear him. “Dangle the bait in front of the mark? Pretend innocence, then show outrage, and do it so well the poor sap believes it?”
“Hijo de una perra,” she hissed through her teeth.
Lucas grinned and drew her closer.
“Don’t be like that, chica. Just because I’m wise to you doesn’t mean I don’t find you appealing. But I’m not a fool. I don’t buy my women—and if I did, I would not pay with my name and my fortune. That you thought I would insults my intelligence.”
“What I thought,” Alyssa said, her voice trembling, “was that you were too horrible to get a woman on your own. And, clearly, I was right.”
She gasped as he tightened his hold.
“So horrible you kissed me as if you never kissed a man before? As if having me drink from your mouth is what you’ve waited for all your life?” His smile faded. “Or are you that fine an actress? Shall we try it again and see?”
“Prince Lucas,” Norton said quickly, “please, sir, you’ve got this wrong.”
The lawyer’s voice quaked. He looked, Lucas thought with grim satisfaction, like a man watching a lighted match falling oh-so-slowly toward a box of dynamite.
“Miss McDonough—Alyssa is telling the truth. This was your grandfather’s idea. And my client’s,” he added quickly.
“I find that difficult to believe.”
“It’s true, sir. Prince Felix can confirm it. Miss McDonough knew nothing about the arrangement until Aloysius’s death.”
“That’s when you told her the happy news? That she would become a princesa?” Lucas smiled coldly. “But you’re a bright girl, amada. You must have known how easily such good luck could slip through your fingers. How hard you must have worked to come up with a scheme that would keep me from getting away.”
&
nbsp; “Sir,” Norton pleaded, “call your grandfather. Let him confirm my story.”
“Why should I bother? I’m not going to honor this—this joke of a contract, Norton. You managed to defraud an old man, but—”
“Your grandfather paid half the sale price, Your Worship. Only half. And I did not—”
“Half is more than this desolate piece of land is worth.” Lucas dropped Alyssa’s wrist. She stumbled back, rubbing at the welt his fingers had left in her tender flesh. “You want more, sue us for it.”
“I strongly urge you to phone Prince Felix,” Norton said quietly. “I have no wish to sue you, sir, but I have an obligation to see my client’s wishes to their rightful end.”
The pudgy, small-town counselor, still shaken, seemed determined to stand his ground. That, more than anything, gave Lucas pause.
He’d already admitted, if only to himself, that Felix might have agreed to this nonsense. Not the marriage contract, of course. That, without question, was something McDonough or Norton or the woman had slipped into the agreement.
But Felix might have said he’d buy the ranch for twice its worth. He was an old man; he was not well; Aloysius McDonough had been his friend.
Why wait until he returned to Spain to ask Felix about the contract? He could get the answers he needed now and close the book on this mess.
If Felix said he had agreed to the purchase, Lucas would honor the contract terms. He’d write out a check and walk away.
The rest, the marriage agreement, the thing these two maniacs kept calling a stipulation, was a joke. He’d mention it to Felix if only for a laugh.
Lucas took his cell phone from his pocket. It was some ungodly hour of the morning back home but he didn’t give a damn.
It was time to get to the bottom of this.
“Out,” he commanded.
The attorney bolted. Alyssa stayed where she was, arms folded.
“This concerns me as much as you,” she said coldly. “I’m not leaving.”
Lucas inclined his head. “Stay, by all means, chica,” he said, just as coldly, “so I can see your face when my grandfather laughs at the supposed ‘stipulation.’”
There were plenty of transmission bars now.
The Billionaires' Brides Bundle Page 35
