The Most Expensive Lie of All

by Michelle Conder

  He’d convinced himself that he could sleep with her for one night and send her home.

  So much for that.

  The reality was that right now he wanted her in his bed—and not because he was paying her a pit full of money but because she wanted to be there. And didn’t that make his head spin? The last time he’d wanted something from a Carmichael he’d been kicked in the teeth, and he was about as likely to let that happen again as the sun rising in the west.

  He thought about her comment about his family treating him like a king. He’d been so caught up in his own sense of betrayal and, yes, his anger at missing out on knowing them that he hadn’t considered his own involvement in continuing that state of affairs. Now he saw it through Aspen’s eyes and it made him want to cringe. Yes, he held himself back. But distance made things easier to manage.

  But she had understood that as well, hadn’t she? ‘That’s a lot for a child to have heaped on his shoulders. You must have really struggled.’

  Yes, it had been a lot. Particularly when Charles Carmichael had been such an exacting and forbidding taskmaster. Maybe others understood what he had gone through but no one had dared say it to his face.

  And her suggestion that he could scowl a little less...?

  He scowled now. Maybe he should just go and find her, have sex with her and be done with her. But something about that snagged in his unconscious. Something wasn’t right about her hot and cold responses but he couldn’t put his finger on what it was.

  ‘I can’t believe it. I’ve ruined it.’

  Why would she have said that? If anything he’d ruined it by stopping. But she hadn’t questioned that, had she? She’d had a look on her face that was one of resigned acceptance and moved on.

  And hard on the heels of that thought was her comment about her marriage to Anderson being a disaster. He’d wanted to push her on that but had decided not to. Now he wished he had. There was something about the lack of defiance in her eyes when she had mentioned her ex that bothered him. Almost as if she’d been terribly hurt by the whole thing.

  He frowned. The truth was he shouldn’t give a damn about Aspen Carmichael, or her feelings, or her comments, and he didn’t know why he did.

  Throwing off his tangled thoughts, he tentatively pushed open his bedroom door and stopped short when he found the room empty. His wardrobe door lay open and a stream of feminine clothing crossed his room like a trail of breadcrumbs where she had obviously dropped them as she’d carried her things out.

  Gingerly he picked them up and placed them on the corner chair. She’d no doubt be upset to realise she’d dropped them. Especially the silky peach-coloured panties. He rubbed the fabric between his thumb and forefinger and his body reacted like a devoted dog that had just seen its master return after a year-long absence.

  ‘Not tonight, Josephine,’ he muttered, heading for the shower.

  A cold one.

  Cruz rubbed his rough jaw and picked up his razor. Unbidden, Charles Carmichael’s rangy features came to his mind. Initially he had admired his determination and objectivity. His loyalty. Only those traits hadn’t stacked up in the end. The man had been ruthless more than determined, cold rather than objective, and his loyalty had been prejudiced towards his own kind.

  Had he degenerated into that person? Had he become a hollow version of the man he’d thought he was? He stopped shaving and stared at the remaining cream on his face. Why did his life suddenly feel so empty? So superficial?

  Hold on. His life wasn’t empty or superficial. He barked out a short laugh. He had everything a man could want. Money. Power. Women. Respect.

  His razor nicked the delicate skin just under his jaw.

  Respect.

  He didn’t have everyone’s respect. He didn’t have Aspen’s. And he didn’t have his own right now, either.

  He thought again about the night Aspen had set him up. He supposed he could have defended himself against Carmichael’s prejudiced accusations and changed the course of his life, but something in Aspen’s eyes that night had stayed him. Fear? Devastation? Embarrassment? He’d never asked. He’d just felt angry and bitter that she had stolen his future.

  Only she hadn’t, had she? He’d disowned it. He’d thrown it all in. Nobody made a fool of a Rodriguez—wasn’t that what his padre would have said?

  He took a deep steadying breath, flexed his shoulders and heard his neck crack back into place.

  So, okay, in the morning he would tell Aspen to go home. He wouldn’t sleep with her in exchange for the money. She could have it. But she still wasn’t getting The Farm. He wanted it, and what he wanted he got.

  End of story.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  WHEN SHE WOKE the next morning and decided she really couldn’t hang out in her room all day Aspen ventured out into the living area of Cruz’s luxury penthouse and breathed a sigh of relief to find it empty. Empty bar the lingering traces of his mouth-watering aftershave, that was.

  After making sure that he really had gone she sucked in a grateful breath, so on edge she nearly jumped out of her skin when the phone in her hand buzzed with an incoming text.

  Make yourself comfortable and charge whatever you want to the room. We’ll talk tonight.

  ‘About a ticket home?’ she mused aloud.

  The disaster of the previous night winged into her thoughts like a homing pigeon.

  In the back of her mind Aspen had imagined that they would try to have sex, she would freeze, Cruz might or might not laugh, and Aspen would return home. Then she would get on with her life and never think of him again.

  Only nothing was normal with Cruz. Not her inability to hate him for his ruthlessness or her physical reaction to him. Because while she had been in his arms last night she had forgotten to be worried. She’d been unable to do anything but feel, and his touch had felt amazing. So amazing that she’d mistakenly believed it might work. That this time she would be okay. Then she’d panicked and he’d stopped. And she really didn’t want to analyse why that was.

  ‘Urgh.’ She blew out a breath. ‘You weren’t going to replay that train wreck again, remember?’

  Right.

  Determinedly she dropped her phone into her handbag and poured herself a steaming cup of coffee from the silver tray set on the mahogany dining table.

  There was an array of gleaming dome-covered plates, and as she lifted each one in turn she wondered if Cruz had ordered the entire menu for breakfast and then realised that he wasn’t hungry. Her own stomach signalled that she was ravenous and Aspen placed scrambled eggs and bacon on a plate and tucked in.

  Unsure what do with herself, she checked in with Donny and Mrs Randall and then decided to do some studying. She was doing a double load at university next semester, so she could qualify by the end of the year, and she needed to get her head around the coursework before assignments started rolling in.

  But she couldn’t concentrate.

  A horse whinnied in the distance and another answered.

  The call of the wild, she mused with a faint smile. She walked out onto the balcony and leant on the railing. The grooms in the distance were leading a group of horses through their morning exercises and the sight made her feel homesick.

  * * *

  It was probably a mistake to go looking for her, but after three hours locked in a business meeting with his executive team, who had flown in from all over the States for a strategy session, Cruz’s brain was fried. Distracted by a curly-haired blonde. He told his team to take an early lunch, because he knew better than to push something when it wasn’t working. Once he’d found Aspen and organised for her to return to Ocean Haven he’d be able to think again. Until then at least the members of his team could find something more productive to do than repeat every point back to him for the rest of the day.

 
But, annoyingly, Aspen wasn’t anywhere he had expected her to be. Not in his penthouse, nor the hotel boutiques, not one of the five hotel restaurants, nor the day spa. When he described her to his staff they all looked at him as if he was describing some fantasy woman.

  Yeah, your fantasy woman.

  Feeling more and more agitated, he stopped by the concierge’s desk in case she had taken a taxi into town on her own. It would be just like her to do something monumentally stupid and cause him even more problems. Of course the concierge on duty knew immediately who he was talking about and that just turned his mood blacker.

  ‘The strawberry blonde babe with the pre-Raphaelite curls all the way down to her—?’

  ‘Yes, that one,’ Cruz snapped, realising that someone—him—had neglected to inform his staff that she was off-limits.

  Oblivious to his mounting tension, the concierge continued blithely, ‘She’s in the stables. At least she was a couple of hours ago.’

  And how, he wanted to ask the hapless youth, do you know that? His mind conjured up all sorts of clandestine meetings between her and his college-age employee.

  Growling under his breath, Cruz stalked across the wide expanse of green lawn that had nothing on her eyes towards the main stable. He reminded himself that if he’d waited around for her to wake up he would now know where she was and what she was up to.

  Survival tactics? his conscience proposed.

  Busy, Cruz amended.

  He heard the lovely sound of her laughter before he saw her, and then the sight of her long legs encased in snug jeans came into view. He couldn’t see the rest of her; bent as she was over the stall door, but frankly he couldn’t take his eyes off her wiggling hips and the mouthwatering curve of her backside.

  Another giggle brought his eyes up and he had to clear his throat twice before she reared back and stood in front of him. Cruz glanced inside the stall in time to see one of his men stuffing his wallet into his back pocket, a guilty flush suffusing his neck.

  Unused to such testy feelings of jealousy, and on the verge of grabbing his very married assistant trainer by the throat and hauling him off the premises, Cruz clenched his jaw. ‘I believe your services are required elsewhere, Señor Martin.’

  ‘Of course, sir.’ His trainer swallowed hard as he opened the stall door and ducked around Aspen. ‘Excuse me, señorita.’

  ‘Oh, we were just—’ Aspen stopped speaking as Luis turned worried eyes her way, and she glanced at Cruz to find his icy stare on the man. He might have been wearing another expensive suit, but he looked anything but civilised, she noted. In fact he looked breathtakingly uncivilised—as if he had a band of warriors waiting outside to raid the place.

  Irritated both by his overbearing attitude and the way her heart did a little dance behind her breastbone at the sight of him, Aspen went on the attack. ‘Don’t tell me.’ She arched a brow. ‘You’ve suddenly decided you’re in the mood?’

  ‘No.’

  His expression grew stormier and he stepped into her space until Aspen found herself inside the stall with the almost sleeping horse Luis had been tending to.

  ‘What are you up to, Aspen?’ he rasped harshly, blocking the doorway.

  Wanting to put space between them, Aspen stepped lightly around the mare and picked up the discarded brush Luis had been using to groom her.

  ‘I feel bad that Luis didn’t get to finish in here because of our conversation so I thought I’d brush Bandit down for him.’

  ‘I meant with him?’

  She paused, not liking the tone of his voice. ‘If you’re implying what I think you are then, yes, I did offer to sleep with Luis—but unfortunately he only has a spare nine million lying around.’ She shrugged as if to say, What can you do?

  ‘Don’t be smart.’

  Aspen glared at him. ‘Then don’t be insulting.’

  He looked at her as if he was contemplating throttling her, but even that wasn’t enough to stop the thrilling buzz coursing through her body at his closeness.

  Aspen shook her head as much at herself as him. ‘You really have a low opinion of me, don’t you, Cruz?’

  ‘Look at it from my point of view.’ He balled his hands on his hips. ‘I come out here to find you giggling like a schoolgirl and one of my best trainers stuffing his wallet back into his pocket. What am I supposed to think?’

  Aspen’s gaze was icily steady on his. ‘That he was showing me pictures of his children being dragged along by the family goat.’

  A beat passed in which she wouldn’t have been surprised if Cruz had turned and walked away as he had the night before. It seemed to be his modus operandi when confronted with anything remotely emotional. Only he didn’t.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said abruptly, raking a hand through his hair. ‘I might have overreacted.’

  Aspen had never had a man apologise to her before and it completely took the wind out of her sails. ‘Well, okay...’

  For the first time in her dealings with him he looked a tad uncomfortable. ‘I didn’t come here to quarrel with you.’

  ‘What did you come here for? If you’re checking on Bandit’s cankers I had a look at the affected hoof before and it’s completely healed.’

  Cruz frowned. ‘That’s for the vet to decide, not you.’

  ‘The vet was busy and I know what I’m doing. I’m one semester away from becoming a fully qualified vet. Plus, I’ve treated a couple of our horses for the disease. So,’ she couldn’t resist adding, ‘not just marrying to secure my future, then.’

  A muscle ticked in his jaw. ‘You enjoyed telling me that, didn’t you?’

  ‘It did feel rather good, yes.’

  They stared at each other and then his mouth kicked up at the corners. ‘I suppose you want another apology?’

  What she wanted was for him to stop smiling and scowl again so she could catch her breath. ‘Would it be too much to hope for, do you think?’

  ‘Probably.’

  Aspen couldn’t hold back a grin and quickly ducked down to pick up Bandit’s rear hoof and clean it.

  ‘You’ve changed,’ he said softly.

  She looked up and he nodded to the tool in her hand.

  ‘You used to be much more of a princess type.’

  ‘Really?’ Her green eyes sparkled with amusement. ‘That’s how you saw me?’

  ‘That’s how all the boys saw you.’ He shrugged. ‘We got your horse ready and you rode it and then we brushed it down at the end. Back then you wouldn’t have even known how to use one of those.’

  Aspen grimaced and went back to work on the horse. ‘That was because my grandfather wouldn’t let me work with the horses. He had very clear ideas on a woman’s place in the world. It was why my mother left. She didn’t really talk to me about him, but I remember overhearing her talking to a friend and saying that he didn’t understand anyone else’s opinion but his own.’

  Satisfied that the horse’s feet were clean, Aspen patted her rump and collected the wooden toolbox. ‘You’re done for the day, girl.’

  She glanced up as Cruz continued to block the doorway. The sound of someone moving tack around further along the stable rattled between them.

  ‘Why did you set me up that night?’

  The suddenness of the question and the harshness of his tone jolted her.

  ‘What are you talking about?’ She couldn’t think how she had set him up, but—

  ‘Eight years ago. You and your fiancé.’

  ‘Fiancé?’

  She frowned and then realised that he was talking about the night her grandfather had found them. She had no idea what he meant by setting him up, but it shocked her that he thought she’d been engaged to Chad at the time. Then she recalled her grandfather’s vitriolic outburst. Something she’d shoved into the deep
est recess of her mind.

  She grimaced as it all came rushing back. ‘Chad and I weren’t actually engaged that night,’ she said slowly.

  ‘Your grandfather certainly thought you were.’

  ‘That’s because I later learned that he had accepted Chad’s proposal on my behalf.’

  Cruz swore. ‘You’re saying he forced you to go along with it?’

  Aspen hesitated. ‘No. I could have turned him down.’

  ‘But you didn’t?’

  ‘No, but I certainly didn’t consider myself engaged when I walked into the stables and saw you there.’

  ‘How about when you kissed me?’

  Aspen shifted uncomfortably. ‘No, not then either.’

  ‘That still doesn’t answer my question.’

  Aspen couldn’t remember his question, her mind so full of memories and guilt. ‘What question?’

  ‘Why you set me up.’

  She shook her head. ‘I don’t really understand what you mean by that.’

  Cruz took in her wary gaze, frustration and desire biting into him like an annoying insect. ‘You’re saying it was a coincidence that your grandfather just happened to come across us and then just happened to kick me off the property, thereby paving the way for Anderson to take over as captain of the dream team?’

  Her eyes widened with what appeared to be genuine shock. ‘I would never...’ She blinked as if she was trying to clear her thoughts. ‘Grandfather said it was your decision to leave Ocean Haven.’

  Cruz scoffed at the absurdity of her statement. ‘It was one of those “you can go under your own steam or mine” type of offers,’ he said bitterly.

  But he could admit to a little resentment, couldn’t he? He’d given Charles Carmichael eleven years of abject devotion that had been repaid with anger and accusations and the revocation of every promise the old man had ever made him.