The Spaniard's Woman

by Diana Hamilton

  His blood heated, charged through his veins, and if he didn’t switch his mind to something else, pronto, he was going to embarrass himself. Hugely.

  Avoiding her radiant eyes, he stared at that pulse-beat. There was something lacking. Something else he could do. Something that would take his mind off sex.

  Roughly clearing his throat, he gave her his arm to hang on to.

  ‘Let’s go!’ He swept her out to the waiting limo. ‘We need to be some place else.’

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  MADRE Di Dio! It hadn’t worked.

  Neither had the long walk they’d taken in Regents Park after the visit to the jeweller’s.

  Sebastian ended the call he’d been making to the firm of caterers he always used when he entertained at his London apartment, thrust his slim mobile into his inner breast pocket and joined Rosie in the back of the limo. At least the caterer’s presence this evening would ensure he didn’t jump her.

  He frowned. He hoped it would.

  He’d intended to take her out for dinner, somewhere glitzy, to see and be seen, but the way his body kept reacting had ruled that right out of play. The idea of making a fool of himself in a public place—which, given the state of his libido, he probably would—gave him the shudders.

  Leaning forward, he gave the driver his instructions and had a vivid mental flashback of Rosie running to the front of the car and telling the stuffily correct chauffeur when he’d dropped them off for that walk in the park, ‘We’ve not stopped for lunch because we had a huge breakfast. But I’m sure you must be starving. We won’t mind waiting while you go and get something to eat.’

  She’d looked so concerned, her lovely head tipped to one side, and not altogether convinced when the starchy, impeccably uniformed man had immediately thawed, his craggy face transformed by a fatherly grin as he’d confided, ‘That’s thoughtful of you, madam. But the missus always makes me a packed lunch. You just enjoy your walk now.’

  Sebastian slid the glass panel back into place and subsided against the leather upholstery. When had he ever heard his date concern herself about the well-being of another human being, let alone someone he would consider to be a humble minion and so far beneath her they weren’t worth noticing?

  Never. Ever.

  Aware of every breath she took, he glared straight ahead, not trusting himself to look at her.

  He wanted to have sex with her. Here. Now.

  Oblivious, Rosie fingered the fine gold chain around her neck.

  Sebastian had insisted on buying it; he’d whisked her into a jeweller’s and had taken ages making his selection. Then, when he’d lifted her hair and fastened the cool gold links around her neck, the heated brush of his fingers on her nape had made her breasts strain against her suit jacket which, as it had happened, had been pressed against his chest. She hoped he hadn’t noticed.

  She hadn’t wanted him to spend any more money on her, and she’d told him so, but she’d had to agree with him that the chain did set the suit off beautifully.

  The lovely suit would wear out eventually, but the gold chain would last for ever. If she ever had a daughter she would pass it on to her, she decided dreamily. And tell her how it had been given to her by the most handsome man ever to walk the planet, a man she had only known briefly but had loved with all of her heart.

  Shades of her own mother! Her hand dropped heavily to her lap. Maybe she was already carrying that daughter. Sebastian’s child.

  Oh, my goodness! Her face flooded with heat. It wasn’t remotely sensible, but she passionately hoped so! Any child of his would be utterly adorable, a part of him that would be hers for always.

  A sudden flash of inspiration made the breath snag in her throat. Turning to him, she gazed at his hard, set profile, her voice low even though she knew the driver, behind his glass partition, couldn’t hear her, ‘We’ve been really dim! You can buy something to test for pregnancy at any chemist, can’t you? Then we’d know for sure, wouldn’t we?’

  Yeah. Right.

  Sebastian felt her eyes on him and didn’t move. Stared ahead at the back of the driver’s neck.

  And the morning after pill. Don’t forget that. It had been the first thing he’d thought about. And immediately discounted.

  Because subconsciously he’d wanted her to be carrying his child?

  And he’d ruled out a pregnancy test. Because he’d needed an excuse to keep her with him?

  Doing a test had only just occurred to her. Her naivety was one of the thousands of things he liked about her. With a smothered groan he turned to her. He ached to take her in his arms. She gave him an encouraging smile. Sebastian shuddered; she had no idea what she was doing to him. She was probably expecting him to instruct the driver to stop at the first chemist’s shop they came to. And he knew then that whether she was pregnant or not he wanted to keep her with him.

  And it wasn’t just sex. There was a lot more to it than that.

  He closed his eyes, his jaw tightening. The need to take her in his arms, hold her, kiss her senseless, was fiercely strong, and it was probably just as well they were now sweeping into the underground parking lot of the apartment block. He was going to have to think long and hard about what he really wanted, no jumping in feet first. He’d done that ten years ago, landed a cropper and learned a useful lesson.

  But Rosie wasn’t like Magdalena, or any of the other glossy harpies who had cash registers for hearts—

  ‘Sir?’

  Aware that he was still glaring straight ahead, that Rosie had exited the car and the driver was holding the door for him, Sebastian got a firm hold on himself. He’d already been more than rash where Rosie was concerned. The little fact that his behaviour had been unprecedented was neither here nor there.

  He had to use his head, not think with his hormones.

  Concluding his business with the driver, he escorted Rosie to the lift. His subconscious might have dismissed the pregnancy test but it was time his clear-thinking logical mind took control.

  There would be time to purchase the necessary first thing in the morning and do the test before their flight left at midday.

  Ignoring the sour lurch of his guts produced by the fact that if the test turned up negative her ticket on the flight to Jerez wouldn’t be used because as far as she was concerned she would have no need to accompany him, he allowed her to precede him into the small foyer of his apartment.

  His head told him that in that event she would have no cause for complaint. His former lovers would have been satisfied with what he had done for little Rosie Lambert today. He knew, down to the last cent, the price demanded at the end of the affair, and what had happened with Rosie could hardly be called that.

  So why did his heart sing to a different tune?

  ‘Oh, my giddy aunt!’ In front of him Rosie stumbled awkwardly and Sebastian instinctively steadied her, clamping both hands around her tiny waist to stop her from falling. ‘Who left all this stuff here?’

  She knew she sounded as if all the breath had whooshed out of her lungs and hoped he’d put it down to her having nearly fallen flat on her face over the mounds of boxes and distinctively elegant carriers filling the floor space, and not guess that the dominating pressure of his long supple hands around her waist was responsible for some sort of cataclysmic internal explosion.

  ‘Whatever is it?’ she squawked, and hated herself for her total lack of cool.

  ‘Do you really have to ask?’ he parried curtly, immediately dropping his hands. The warmth of her body was stealing through her jacket, scorching his skin. Stuffing his hands in his

  trouser pockets, out of harm’s way, he stepped over the pile. I had them delivered. The janitor has a key. I suggest you sort through them and pack what you’ll need for Spain.’

  He clamped his mouth on the words, but he couldn’t take them back. She might not be accompanying him to his mother’s home, might she?

  Cursing himself for allowing her to tie him in knots, he offered tersely,
I’ll help you carry them to your room,’ and met her wide, shocked eyes.

  ‘You can’t!’

  All those clothes? All the things he’d given the nod to?

  Everything she’d modelled for him?

  She was horrified. The stuff must have cost a bomb! Accepting the suit and the gold chain had made her uncomfortable.

  Accepting this lot was completely out of the question.

  Ignoring the anguished look in her beautiful sapphire eyes, he deliberately misread her blurted statement, bending to lift a stack of boxes. I’m not in my dotage. I’m capable of carrying a few boxes,’ he told her curtly, turned his back on her and strode towards her bedroom.

  ‘But—’ Dismayed, she scurried after him. He’d put the distinctive gold and white boxes on the bed and was already removing the tops. I didn’t mean you were too feeble to carry them,’ she snapped. ‘You know I didn’t!’ She planted her feet apart and folded her arms high across her chest. I can’t accept this stuff. It’s way too much. And I’d never get to wear it, in any case. It’s such a waste. Send it all back!’

  ‘Can’t. And it’s no use to me.’ Sebastian straightened, the gold tissue evening dress that had made her look so stunningly spectacular dangling from his fingers, taking in her confrontational stance. Warmth flooded his heart, spread rapidly through his veins, prompting him to murmur huskily, I’m not into cross-dressing.’ He badly wanted to see her answering radiant smile.

  For a moment Rosie was severely tempted into succumbing to the laughter lights in those compelling silver eyes, to the twitch of humour that softened the hard sensual lines of his kissable mouth. She resisted with difficulty. This was a serious issue.

  Injecting scorn into her voice, she ignored his crack about cross-dressing and reminded him, ‘You invented my cover story, remember? I’m suppose to be some sort of ladies’ maid.’

  Her upper lip curled with unhidden distaste. The more she thought about the role she would be expected to play, the less she liked it. But it would give her the chance to see her father and, hopefully, get an inkling of what he was like.

  Her duplicity in this had her not liking herself very much and had her tacking on in defensive grumpiness, I should look humble, so instead of all this—’ a wild sweep of one arm indicated the results of his morning’s misguided shopping spreeyou should have bought a plain black dress and a neat white pinny and maybe thrown in a sensible nylon overall for when I’m cleaning the lady’s shoes!’

  Her reminder came like a slap on the face. The thought of this beautiful creature in a menial capacity, at the beck and call of a woman like Terrina, left a poisonous taste in his mouth.

  His lips flattened savagely. ‘Change of plan. I don’t know why I came up with that scenario. You will be going to my country with me as my guest. A true equal in every way there is.’ His eyes glittered. And, on the subject of cleaning her shoes, Terrina’s not fit to so much as touch yours.’

  ‘Wow!’ Rosie expelled a long, pent-up breath, her eyes widening. He looked all simmering, potent male.

  And did he really regard her as his equal? The very idea made her tremble. She had fallen in love with a man so far above her class that the idea of him introducing her as his guest was difficult to assimilate.

  She saw the tension leave his wide shoulders, saw his rock-hard features relax into a sudden smile. And when he held out the dress he’d been holding and said, ‘Wear this for me tonight.

  We’re eating in. The caterers will be arriving soon. I’ll bring the rest of the stuff through,’ her whole body was flooded with such a strange excitement she felt she was floating, out of control, a puppet being pulled by a master’s strings.

  An hour later she surveyed her reflection and tried to control the persistent wriggle of excitement that was squirming around in her stomach.

  She hardly recognised herself. She looked expensive, special.

  Her hair shimmered, a soft pale gold, and the chain glittered against her throat. And the dress was out-of-this-world, the gold tissue halter straps fastening neatly at her nape softly widening, clinging to the curve of her breasts to meet the narrow waistline and fall sleekly to the knee-length hemline of the skirt.

  Her back was bare to just above her waist, so she hadn’t been able to wear one of the lacy bras she’d found in one of the carriers. Just a filmy pair of briefs, a wicked suspender belt and a pair of sheer silk stockings.

  She felt like a kept woman. A pampered, indulged mistress. She caught the reflected and definitely sinful curve of her full pink lips, quelled any lingering misgivings and decided that, for tonight at least, she wasn’t going to knock it. She would go with this wildly excited, scary feeling; she would pretend she really was special, the Spaniard’s woman.

  Tomorrow would be soon enough to plonk her feet firmly back on the ground, to nip out and buy that pregnancy test thing, and if it was negative put plan B into action—visiting Troone Manor when she knew her father was back there.

  And if it was positive? Well, just for tonight she wasn’t going to think about that.

  ‘Senor Garcia is in the living area, madam.’

  ‘Oh. Right. Thanks.’ Flicking the white-coated waiter an apologetic smile, Rosie backed out of the kitchen. She wasn’t wanted there. The space-age film set had been taken over by the caterers. A smart young waiter had been pulling on his white gloves and an efficient-looking woman was doing something with a stainless steel dish and the state-of-the-art oven.

  Swaying on the three-inch heels of her gold kid shoes, she headed for the living room, the softly shimmering fabric of her skirt brushing sensuously against her silk-clad legs. It made her feel turned on. As if to prove that unfortunate state of affairs her breasts tingled, hardened and peaked against the gossamer-fine barrier of her halter top, and she shivered even as a light beading of perspiration adorned her short upper lip.

  Heaven help her! This dress was wicked! She should have pushed it back into its folds of tissue paper, stuffed it back in its box and clambered into her old jeans and jumper. He had commanded and she’d jumped, more fool her. Because just look where besotted obedience had got her-all dolled up like a dog’s dinner, fantasising about being the Spaniard’s woman!

  As if!

  In increasing turmoil, Rosie pushed open the door, and the sight of an immaculately dinner-suited Sebastian staring out of one of the tall windows at the million city lights spread out beneath him didn’t settle her nerves one tiny little bit.

  He had his back to her. The commanding width of his shoulders, the way his body tapered to narrow hips and the length of his elegantly trousered legs made her mouth run dry.

  He was such a beautiful specimen of dominant masculinity he made her head spin and her poor heart beat like a steam hammer.

  And then he turned, even though she’d been really quiet, hovering in the doorway like a paralysed mouse, and she glimpsed the hard, set features of his angular face for a split second before his hooded silver eyes made a comprehensive sweep of her now drastically overheated body. And then he smiled. A slow, sultry curving of that sensual mouth. It blew her mind.

  ‘You are gorgeous, cara mia.’ He held out his hand. ‘Come to me.’

  His low sexy drawl should have unsettled her even further but it did no such thing. It washed through her veins like wildfire and made her heart sing. Plunged back into fantasy land, she obeyed his command and walked towards him, but slowly, submitting to his will but sensing a glorious power of her own for the very first time in her life.

  A power in the way he watched her every movement, the lowering of his eyelids so that the slits of silver were intensified to a fevered brilliance beneath the thick dark sweep of his lashes. A power in the way the faint dull flush of male desire across his angular slashing cheekbones betrayed him.

  The whisper of the costly fabric against her silk-covered legs, the way he was looking at her—as if he were drawn into her magical fantasy—made her shatteringly aware of her femininity. And when
his outstretched hand reached for hers she stopped breathing. The electrically charged touch of warm skin and hard bone told her she was playing with fire.

  And it was addictive.

  ‘Never let anyone tell you, you are anything other than perfect.’

  Sebastian raised her hand to his lips and watched the wild rose colour heighten the brilliance of her eyes, saw the erratic pulse beat at the base of her slender white throat just above the slender gold chain, and stopped, fighting.

  He would give her sapphires to match the beauty of those endlessly fascinating, dark-fringed eyes, fasten them around her neck, her wrists, fine diamonds worthy of gracing her fingers. Rosie, who had never asked or expected anything of him, would be lavished with everything great wealth could buy.

  She would be his woman.

  His taut body surged. The wooing had only just begun. He had been a blind fool to fight against what she could do to him, to deprive himself of the ecstasy that was in her power alone to give him.

  If she wanted him.

  His heart crashed against his ribs. She’d been a virgin. She wasn’t promiscuous. That had to mean their night of wild passion had meant something to her, that it hadn’t just been a lusty itch that had needed to be scratched. Had to!

  A pulse beat at his temples. He had to know. He lifted her cool hand and brought it to the side of his face and had his answer.

  She moved closer. He could feel the fine tremors that raced through her slender frame. Her lush mouth was parted, soft and full, slick and moist. Her trapped hand gently unfurled, her long fingers lying against the hard plane of his face, the other lifting, shyly following the shape of his mouth.

  Sebastian hauled in an aching breath when she raised desire-drowned eyes to his. She was his! He had her! Life had never tasted as sweet!

  Blood thundered in his ears, deafening him. He dipped his dark head to plunder her mouth with his own but a movement in his peripheral vision stopped him.