The Spanish Billionaire's Hired Bride

by Rachel Lyndhurst

  “Ah, yes,” Ricardo said, his eyes flitting from one woman to the other appearing to sense that this situation needed delicate handling. “Helen, tesoro, why don’t you take yourself up to the pool and I’ll bring you something to drink in a few minutes?”

  Helen took the hint immediately and was relieved to be leaving the domain that was clearly not intended to be hers. The pool was easy to find around the back of the house, an enormous infinity one with spectacular views over the bay below.

  Feeling in a very bad mood and also feeling annoyingly hungry, Helen lowered herself down to the pool edge, kicked off her sandals, and dipped her feet into the deep clear water. As smooth ripples lapped around her ankles, a flash reflected up from the water. It was the morning sun hitting the massive diamond on her hand. It no longer seemed ostentatious, not here. Everything about Ricardo’s life was big and expensive. The biggest and the best, even down to his lovemaking, the hum of her aching muscles was testament to that. Correction: not lovemaking, but wildly intense, consensual sex. The word love wasn’t part of their deal.

  She held the ring a little closer. It was astonishingly beautiful, large clear flawless facets. She’d never looked at it closely in daylight before. Talk about marrying in haste! The stone itself was the size of a small mosaic tile, square with its rounded edges set in gold. She twisted it around and noticed an interruption in the smooth yellow metal mount. Squinting in the sunlight she made out some engraving. A lion’s head, similar to the cufflinks Ricardo had been wearing when their worlds had first collided in the Condesa’s boudoir. Helen laughed at the memory. She had sincerely thought he was about to kill her, but then she went and married her so-called assailant!

  The lion’s head had to be an Almanza crest of some sort. It suited him. He too was ferocious, proud, and magnificent. She twisted the ring in the opposite direction expecting to see a matching cat, but there was a different shape entirely. It was a flower. Looking at the leaves and the shape of its petals, it was just like a primrose… Helen swallowed. Did they have primroses in Spain? Or was it a reference to Primrose Farm? It had to be. Ricardo must have had the ring specially made for her. But surely even the keenest paparazzi lens couldn’t pick out such an intimate detail? Why had he done such a thing?

  She was surprisingly moved by the gesture. The man had made quite an effort in the few days before their hasty wedding. He had also pointed out the clause in the pre-nup that insisted all clothes, accessories, and jewelry were hers to keep. And she would. The ring was probably worth a fortune in scrap alone, but she’d never sell it. Ricardo had given it to her, and it was special.

  Her pleasure faded quickly, however, as she remembered the precise details of when he’d given her the ring. He hadn’t gone down on one knee, said he loved her and pleaded for her hand. No, not quite. He’d chucked it at her and left the room without a backwards glance to see if she even liked it. Helen sighed sadly and closed her eyes against the bright sunshine.

  This was a business deal with the added bonus of some hot sex thrown in. Three months was enough to keep up appearances. Could a honeymoon last that long? There were so many unasked questions about this marriage.

  “Food!”

  Helen’s nose twitched as Ricardo slid a plate of warm sugar-coated pastries and a cup of coffee down beside her on a wooden tray. “I’m not sure I dare try one of those,” she murmured.

  “And why not?”

  “Because Lucia hates me. She’ll have slung some Menorcan hemlock in there.”

  Ricardo bit lavishly down into one of the sweet morsels and Helen’s mouth began to water as crispy flakes crumbled down the front of his T-shirt. “Death by cake sounds fine to me,” he said.

  Helen snatched up a round one with a glossy half moon of yellow nestling in its center. “Greedy bloody sod.”

  “Hmmm.”

  “I hope you choke,” she muttered with half a smile and closed her eyes as buttery almonds, vanilla, and peach melted like sin on her tongue.

  “If I go before you do, darling,” he said with a grin, “you’ll be a very rich woman. A merry widow who won’t have to worry about cooking for herself ever again.”

  “Rubbish. If your lawyer hasn’t covered your sudden death by cake then he should be struck off.” She accepted the fat china cup of café con leche that he handed her. “Anyway, I didn’t know you were a banker.”

  “You don’t know that much about me at all.” He helped himself to a cigar-shaped delight with a chocolate center. “This is a marriage of convenience, remember?”

  Helen laughed in spite of herself. “Fair enough, I deserved that.”

  “Lucia doesn’t hate you, for what it’s worth.”

  “I’d never have guessed.”

  “You should have a chat with her newest daughter-in-law. Believe me, you have no idea how protective Menorcan mamas can be. Anyway, you can relax, she just went home.”

  “Does she ever smile?”

  “After and during cider she does.”

  Helen snorted. “Blimey, I’d like to see that!”

  “Stick around until the next family celebration and you just might, along with her husband’s famous spit roast pork. It’s the only time she doesn’t cook, because she’s too…happy.” His eyebrows lifted at the sound of a telephone ringing inside the house. “Who the hell is that? I don’t think that phone’s rung in about three years!”

  Helen watched as he marched quickly through an arch on the terrace and waited silently until the sound of ringing stopped. She wondered if she would be around when the next family celebration occurred. Part of her hoped there would be one within the next three months.

  Ricardo’s harsh voice behind her made her jump. “I need you to swallow that mouthful and be very brave.” His expression was serious. “I’m sorry to have to ask, but I think I might need your help.”

  “What’s happened?”

  “Lucia’s son, her eldest, his house is on fire. His wife and kids are inside and he’s trying to get to them, but the staircase has collapsed. The emergency services are on their way, but we’re nearer—”

  Helen leaped to her feet and snatched up her bag. “Come on, let’s go.”

  …

  Perhaps he should have left her behind.

  He had no idea what would be waiting for them when they arrived at Tino’s farm. It could be unpleasant. Distressing. Traumatic. But it was too late now. They were in the middle of nowhere and about five minutes away from a burning building with no civilization in between.

  He had to break the silence. “Are you okay?”

  Helen turned to face him, her hair whipping across her face as the Jeep lurched forward over the rough road surface. “I’m the last person you should be worrying about!” she shouted over the noise of flying grit and a hot engine.

  “That’s good to hear.” He hoped she was right as his heart skipped a beat at what lay ahead. She stared in front of her and he could see a muscle working in her jaw. “There’s the smoke. We’ll be there in a couple of minutes.”

  The Jeep skidded to a halt in a shower of grit a few yards from the burning farmhouse. “No flames this side!” Ricardo shouted as he leaped out of the driver’s seat and began to run towards the building. “Must be round the back. Tino!”

  He didn’t hear Helen reply as his feet pounded the rock hard mud drive, but this was no time for social niceties. He wasn’t panicking, but his heart was full of dread at the prospect of what was around the corner. Why did things like this always seem to happen to the nice people?

  Ricardo saw Tino standing with his arms raised to the sky on the back terrace.

  “Senor Almanza! Gracias a Dios! Thank God!”

  Blood trickled down the man’s face, a scarlet trail through grey ash and red soil. His breath came in short bursts. “I’ve tried to get up there by the ladder, but it slips on the terrace. The marble—”

  “Where are they?”

  Tino pointed to an open window two floors up. “Estrella i
s in the bathroom, with the children, safer there. She wouldn’t throw the baby down, she couldn’t do it. She said she was going to soak towels in water, but I keep shouting for her and she’s stopped calling back.” Tino’s voice cracked. “I’m so scared, senor.”

  “How long since she spoke?”

  “A few minutes. Just before I heard your car.”

  “Quickly, the ladder!” Ricardo shouted as he dragged it up off the ground and propped it up against the wall underneath the bathroom window. “Wedge your feet against the bottom and hold it steady so it doesn’t slip again. I’ll go up.”

  “No, senor, it is too dangerous. Let me.”

  Ricardo had been the first to find dead bodies once before. He wasn’t going to let another human being go through that. “I’m taller and stronger than you, Tino. And you’re bleeding everywhere. You’ll frighten them all. Just hold the ladder.” He shot him a stern look and ignored the nausea he was feeling. “Now!”

  The wooden ladder wobbled as he climbed it as quickly and safely as possible, blocking out the sensation of heat he could feel emanating from the building. He thanked God that the old building didn’t have modern tiny inaccessible bathroom windows. He’d be able to climb inside reasonably easily.

  “Estrella!”

  Nothing. His hands shook as he gripped the rough window frame and hauled himself head first inside. There was gray brown smoke. He coughed, the air scraped at his throat and tongue. In the corner of the bathroom was a huddle of fabric. Wet twisted towels and four sleeping angels.

  Twenty seconds of agony elapsed before Ricardo could establish they were all still alive but unconscious. The pressure inside his skull was so intense he could hardly think straight. Exhaling with relief, he made the sign of the cross across his heart before prying the baby from her mother’s arms and then ran choking to the window. The bundle in his hands was hot, damp, and felt too heavy for something so small. The smoke grew thicker and more acrid as Helen and Tino stared anxiously up at him.

  “Helen, hold the ladder. Tino, up here quickly!”

  Tino was visibly shaking as he scrambled up the ladder, tears spilling over his lower lashes. “Is she—”

  “They’re all alive, but we must be quick.” He carefully handed over the baby and smiled encouragingly as she started to cry. “Take her to Helen and come back up and help me.”

  “First aid kit!” Helen yelled up at him. “Got one in the car?”

  “Under the dashboard,” he said, his voice sounding harsher than he intended. “But not until they’re all out and down!”

  Two more trips and Ricardo was carrying down Estrella over his shoulder as the sound of sirens and engines came at last. Ricardo stood back and silently watched as the professionals took over, catching his breath and willing his heart rate to slow down now the situation was under control.

  He felt a cool hand on his forearm. “You saved their lives,” Helen whispered.

  “They would have been okay.” Ricardo closed his eyes for a few seconds. “We should go now.”

  Chapter Nine

  Ricardo was silent and stony-faced on the journey back to the villa, and Helen couldn’t think of anything to say under the circumstances. General chitchat felt inappropriate. The man she had seen in action wasn’t the shallow playboy billionaire she’d thought she’d married. He’d shown extraordinary strength and self-control under pressure, and his hands weren’t shaking with the shock of it all like hers were.

  They’d stayed an hour or so after the ambulance left, and Ricardo had made sure there was somebody to deal with every aspect of the farm while Tino was at the hospital. The animals still had to be fed and stabled, clothes and toiletries would need to be taken to the hospital, phone calls needed to be made, forms filled out…the list seemed endless.

  “I need a drink. I don’t know about you,” he said as they arrived back at the villa. He suddenly looked completely drained. “A large one.”

  “Just what the doctor ordered,” Helen said and tried to keep up as he strode across the drive towards the front door.

  Once inside the living room, its glass doors flung open to the warm sea breeze and cry of seabirds. Ricardo handed her a large tumbler of whiskey before knocking his own back in one go. His voice was gravely. “Sorry, did you want ice?”

  “It’s okay, I’ll get some.” She sniffed the smoky liquid. “I’ll need a dash of lemonade from the kitchen if I’m going to swallow this lot and live.”

  “Sorry, there’s other stuff,” he said and ran his forearm across the soot and sweat on his the forehead. “Come on, let’s see what we can find in there. The fridge is always full.”

  Helen noticed a tremor in his hand as she gave him back her glass. “You have that and then go and have a long hot bath. I can manage a fridge door on my own.”

  “Thanks.” He sipped the second whiskey more slowly. “Sure you don’t mind?”

  “Of course not, as long as Lucia’s not guarding it!”

  “Lucia has her hands full with her family right now. I’ve given her as much time off as she needs. But she’ll be your best friend forever after what you did today, don’t worry.” He drained his glass and put it down with a click on a glass table.

  “I didn’t do much.”

  He shook his head. “You were there for me,” he said quietly. “And for Tino and his family. There to help, no questions asked. Not many women I’ve known would have done that, risked ruining their expensive manicures and hairstyles.”

  Helen glanced down at her hands. Her wedding manicure was a distant memory. She had a torn nail and the rest were full of dirt. “I think I’d better wash these while I’m in the kitchen,” she said laughing. “And then have a bath myself.”

  “Good idea,” Ricardo said and turned to leave. “I’ll see you later.”

  Later? That didn’t sound like an invitation to join him with a bar of soap. Helen shrugged and tried to put her disappointment aside. Thinking he might want her to join him for anything other than sex was irrational, not to mention stupid. She had no right to try to comfort him after the trauma of the fire, or indeed seek comfort herself. This was a business relationship, not an emotional one. She’d feel better after that drink.

  .

  “Do you like seafood?” Ricardo asked as he finished preparing the wood oven on the terrace. “The charcoal will be white-hot and ready in about half an hour.”

  Helen was staring out to sea, the newspaper she had been reading folded neatly on the table beside her. She turned her head to look at him as he approached. “Depends what it is,” she said cautiously, her bright green eyes sparkling like glass in the afternoon sun.

  Ricardo drew up a chair beside her and placed a glass jug and two highball glasses on the table. “Perhaps it would be easier to tell me what you do and don’t like then.”

  “No whelks or oysters, not that I’ve ever been brave enough or drunk enough to try them.”

  “But they’re supposed to make you horny,” he said and felt a zing of pleasure when she rewarded him with a broad grin.

  Helen snorted. “Whelks? Yeah, right, like gagging is romantic.”

  “I meant the oysters. I’ve never had whelks either, I don’t think.”

  “They look like massive snails with disgusting looking gray and yellow innards.” She made a retching noise. “My granny used to pry them out with a pin and drown them in vinegar.”

  Her face was a picture of revulsion and he couldn’t help letting a small laugh escape. “Actually, they do sound disgusting.”

  “They have to be looking like that, don’t they?”

  “I was going to suggest grilling some local red prawns scattered with garlic oil and flakes of sea salt, but if you’d prefer steak ribs—”

  “Oh no, they sound perfect!”

  Ricardo took her small hand in his and rubbed his thumb across the surface of the diamond on her ring finger. “You washed your hands.”

  “I washed everything,” she said provocativ
ely. “I found a bathroom on my way to the kitchen and it looked so inviting …”

  He lifted her hand, twisted it and kissed the inside of her wrist. The skin was delicate and soft, her pulse like the touch of a butterfly’s wing against his lips. “You look and smell wonderful.”

  “Thank you,” she murmured. Color tinted her cheeks, spreading like pink ink dropped in water. “You have immaculate taste in toiletries.”

  “I have immaculate taste in everything,” he said silkily. “Especially where women are concerned.”

  Helen frowned playfully and pulled her hand away. “I bet you say that to all the girls, you feckless swine.”

  Ricardo chuckled. “I love it when you insult me like that, wife.”

  Her eyes widened with mock outrage, and she smacked his forearm with the newspaper. “Make that ‘you feckless pervert swine’!”

  Ricardo just laughed and began to pour from the jug. “How come nobody’s married you before now, Helen? I’m baffled.” Ice cubes clanked and bubbles leapt over the rim of the Murano glassware.

  “I’m only twenty-four, Ricardo. Give a girl a chance!”

  “Seriously, though. I saw the way Hippy looked at you, you can’t have ever been short of boyfriends looking like you do.”

  “Stop fishing about, Almanza, and ask me what you really want to know.” Her emerald gaze held him fast, and he was lost for words for a second or two. She was as sharp as needles.

  “Okay, how many men in your life?” There, he’d said it, she’d made him. He wanted to know.

  “It’s really none of your business.”

  “So?” He did his most persuasive smile, dropped his hand to her knee and began to stroke it.

  She sighed. “Four. None of them particularly serious or long lasting. I moved around a lot with university and travel, and looking back, I think all of them were only after one thing.”

  “You mean—”

  She gestured at her chest, molded into stunning curves by the bronze beaded bodice of her sundress. “I’ve been led to believe I have great tits, but I’m not exactly good marriage material.”