* * *
She had barely finished her shower the next morning when she heard the clatter of hooves outside her open window. Grabbing a couple of towels, she covered herself and padded barefoot to the window. And shot back, seeing Dante on horseback. Her heart was racing, arguing with all the sensible plans she had made to be detached where he was concerned, and above all sensible. It didn’t matter that they had both grown up and moved on in ten years, or that Dante was now a client whose sole intention was to show her the facilities on his ranch. It was enough that he was out there, looking as sexy as sin, for her heart to pound ten to the dozen.
‘Hey, Karina!’
Firming her jaw, she stared out as if she saw a man who looked as rugged and sexy as Dante every day of the week. The impatient look he was giving her suggested that by sheer willpower alone he believed he could draw her down from the window and onto the saddle of the horse at his side. Let him stare. She’d just got out of the shower. Dante might have the turnaround capabilities of a holiday jet, but that didn’t mean she had to rush about. She would behave calmly and act professionally, as she always did.
‘Good morning. Can I help you?’ she asked politely.
‘I want you down here now.’
She flashed five fingers, indicating more time was required.
‘And I don’t have all day to waste,’ Dante growled threateningly.
His expression made her think one finger would have been enough.
Taking the full five minutes, she tied her hair back, and changed into breeches and shirt. She was neat, she was organised. She was ready.
For anything.
Which was probably just as well, as Dante had undergone the full gaucho transformation. His wild black hair was held back by a blood-red bandana and his gold earrings glinted in the sun. He was wearing well-worn, snug-fitting jeans beneath the battered leather chaps all the gauchos wore, and a tight-fitting black top emphasised his bunched and banded muscles. Could she blank her mind to that?
She could blank her mind, but her body had a will of its own, and her nipples rose to salute him when she joined Dante in the yard.
‘So you’re ready at last?’ Looking her up and down with a lazy smile, he handed over the reins of her horse.
She knew that look and gave him one back that said clearly, You’re wasting your time. She didn’t sleep with clients, however ‘honoured’ they might be. She never had. She didn’t sleep with anyone, come to that. How could she? Dante might be the most tempting piece of forbidden fruit around, but she had to think of him as the spoiled fruit the wasp had got to first. If she did that she’d be fine. It was that, or risk getting her heart broken all over again.
‘I take it you can still remember how?’
She looked at him as she checked her horse’s girth, and that look said it all. They both knew horses could hold air in their lungs when the strap beneath their belly was fastened, and then they let it out again once the rider was mounted, causing the saddle to slip dangerously. Guessing the type of ride she was about to have with Dante, she was going to take every safety precaution necessary. Springing into the saddle, she gave him a look. ‘I think I’ll keep up.’
Closing her eyes for a moment as she sucked in a lungful of sweet, clean air, she promised herself that nothing was going to spoil this for her. This was her first ride on the pampas for too long, and she was going to enjoy it to the full. She would learn everything she needed to about his ranch, and then she’d go home to plan the event, happy, single and sane.
Dante led off at a canter, issuing information and instructions as he rode. His facilities were world-class. She had a rough idea of what a set-up like this must have cost. Her brother maintained a vast and well-equipped stud, but Dante’s equestrian centre was on another level again. He had built a full-sized polo club that would have sat proudly in any country, and there was the best accommodation possible for visiting horses, riders and grooms. She already knew about the veterinary hospital and exercise pools, because Gabe had pointed them out to her, but now she discovered there was an Olympic-size swimming pool for their human guests.
‘You live in some style,’ she commented wryly when they finally reined in.
‘Don’t you approve?’
‘It’s not up to me to judge you.’
‘But you do judge me, don’t you, Karina?’
Before she could reply, Dante turned his horse and was soon lost in the distance, a silhouette against the vast blue sky. He was like a dark angel, brooding and powerful, and for now she was left in pursuit. Urging her horse forward, she caught up with him.
‘Where are we going?’ she asked, riding alongside him.
Turning to slant an amused look at her, he chose to ignore the question. ‘You still ride well, Karina.’
‘I always could keep up with you,’ she commented dryly.
‘But you never used to be so suspicious.’
‘And neither did you,’ she pointed out. ‘But that was a long time ago, Dante.’
When neither of them had cause to be suspicious of each other, she thought as his black stare levelled on her face.
Relaxing in the saddle with just one hand on the reins, he shifted his weight almost imperceptibly and his big black horse took off again.
Leaning low over her horse’s neck, she gave him his head. At least riding was as good as she remembered. Her anxieties and suspicions remained, as did the ghosts from the past, but gradually she was relaxing in a way she had never found possible in the city. Maybe the pampas was where she had to be in order to lay those ghosts.
‘There you are,’ he murmured, when she trotted up.
‘You have a bigger horse,’ she pointed out logically, finding the pride of her youth, where competing with Dante was concerned, was still one hundred per cent intact.
He shrugged. ‘Change horses and I’ll still ride faster than you.’
She weighed up his stallion. ‘Would you care to put that to the test?’
They dismounted.
The stallion’s acceleration was phenomenal. It was like sitting on a rocket...or on Dante. Her laughter was carried away on the breeze. She hadn’t felt like this for years. She was soon well in front, with confidence thrilling through her. How could she have forgotten how good riding with Dante felt?
‘What?’
She gasped with outrage when he suddenly appeared in front of her. ‘How did you do that?’
There was no chance he could hear her. He was half a mile ahead. Whispering in the stallion’s ear, she left the big horse in no doubt as to what he had to do. She hadn’t raced like this with Dante since they had been kids riding wild on the range, and she’d have to brush up her skills, as well as the tricks they used to play on each other, if she was going to stand a chance of keeping up. Doggedly, she turned his big stallion in Dante’s direction, and when she finally caught up they exchanged horses without a word.
‘There must be a lot of things you want to ask me,’ he commented as they left their reins loose and allowed the horses to choose the way for a while. ‘Well?’ he prompted. ‘Or are you concerned I might do the same to you?’
His stare on her face was level and hard, and she realised how tense she could so quickly become under his scrutiny. Having picked up the reins and shortened them as if for flight, she was gripping them as if her life depended on it. She wanted to say something, make some excuse, but words wouldn’t come, and with a last cold and knowing look into her eyes Dante gathered up his reins and rode away.
CHAPTER EIGHT
KARINA WAS HOLDING out on him, and trust was essential if they were going to work together successfully. He’d replayed the night they’d slept together over and over in his head, and he was more confident than ever that he’d done the right thing. He could maybe have dressed things up a bit bett
er, but he’d been younger then, and impulsive.
‘Dante?’
Karina was looking at him with concern.
‘Is something wrong?’ she pressed, glancing away as if she knew very well that he expected her to be more open with him.
‘Time is short, and we’ve got a lot of ground to cover,’ he said curtly. His questions would have to wait. They had too much to do to waste time on conversation outside the event they were planning. He led the way through a group of trees planted to screen some groundwork and then reined in.
‘What’s this?’ Karina asked, as she stared down at the ugly gash in the land.
It was the only blemish on his otherwise flawless ranch, but it was one that paid for his lifestyle and for everything that visitors to the polo cup would enjoy. ‘It’s an emerald mine.’
‘Are you serious?’ Karina’s shocked gaze flashed to his.
‘Perfectly.’
She frowned and he could almost see her thinking that this answered a lot of her questions about the source of his immense wealth. ‘Is it yours?’
‘I have a major stake in it,’ he confirmed.
‘At least it explains your Midas touch.’ She relaxed as she smiled—with relief, he guessed.
‘So now you know my secret.’
‘One of them.’ She stared at him steadily. ‘Nicky said you had plans for the future. Plans involving the youngsters who come to the ranch?’
He stonewalled her question with a question of his own. ‘No secrets of your own to share?’
‘No,’ she said flatly, clearly irritated that he wouldn’t share the smallest detail with her. ‘My life would bore you, and even if that weren’t the case, I don’t see how it’s relevant to our business discussions.’
‘One ride across the pampas is hardly going to restore the friendship of our youth.’
‘I hope you can trust me in business?’
He raised a brow. ‘So do I.’
‘So,’ she said, clearly keen to change the subject, ‘can we have tours here on the days of the tournament, or would security be an issue for you?’
‘We can have tours,’ he confirmed.
‘Good,’ she said stiffly. ‘I’ll add them to my list.’
‘Shall we move on?’ he suggested.
She was holding out on him. Each time he looked at Karina her eyes darkened and her lips plumped up, as every female hormone she possessed danced with his machismo. She’d pulled back in Rio rather than risk kissing him, and she was still reluctant to share the smallest personal detail with him. Why?
‘You look thunderous,’ she commented, as they cantered along side by side. ‘Has some detail of my planning annoyed you? If you’d rather leave the tour to the emerald mine out...’
A muscle flexed in his jaw as he stared straight ahead. She’d seen his home. She was living under the same roof as him, pelo amor de Deus! And now she’d seen the emerald mine. He was running out of surprises to try and jolt Karina into sharing whatever it was that was eating away at her. What was so bad she couldn’t tell him?
‘Why don’t you tell me more about the mine, Dante?’ she said in an attempt to restore normality. It made his hackles rise even more. She’d pick any topic to stop him questioning her, but for the sake of their working relationship he’d go along with it—for now.
‘Mining isn’t my specialty, though there have always been old workings here,’ he explained. ‘The old-timers talked constantly about the green ice they used to find here—that’s what they call emeralds—so I decided to investigate. I sold the exploration rights and brought in experts. I used the same consortium that revived the Skavanga diamond mine in northern Europe. The deal was that I got to keep a share in whatever they found. It turned out to be one of the richest seams of emeralds in the world.’
She laughed—with relief at the relaxation in the tension between them, or with genuine pleasure at this discovery of unsuspected riches, he couldn’t tell.
‘I’m not really surprised now I’ve got over the shock of you owning an emerald mine,’ she confessed, smiling at him. ‘I can’t imagine you doing anything on a small scale.’
‘Not if I can help it,’ he agreed, tight-lipped. Urging his horse forward, he put some much-needed thinking space between them.
* * *
She allowed her horse to pick its own way down the slope as she considered the tension in Dante. His back was like an unbreachable wall. Suspicion was riding him, and so far she’d told him very little, but she wouldn’t be rushed into anything. She’d choose her time.
When?
Soon.
To break the tension between them, she decided on a change of subject when she caught up with him. ‘I met your half-sister, Nicky. She’s lovely.’
‘She’s great,’ Dante agreed tersely.
‘Who takes care of the children when she’s not here on the ranch?’
‘Why? Are you volunteering, Karina?’
‘No.’ She huffed a wry laugh. ‘I’ve got my own job to do.’
‘Relieved?’ Dante suggested.
She shrugged. ‘No, but those kids are quite something.’ She paused, hoping Dante would tell her more, but he wasn’t so easy to unravel.
‘The staff will take over.’ He shrugged.
Dante took off again at speed, preventing her asking him any more questions. Hooves were soon thundering beneath them, making any form of conversation impossible, but she guessed Dante would want more answers when they got back to the ranch. She slowed her horse, allowing him to ride ahead of her, just to drink him in. There was no law against glutting herself on powerful shoulders and hard-muscled arms. She had always loved watching Dante ride. He appeared so casual and yet he was fully in control, with one hand on the reins and the other relaxed at his side. He rode smoothly and efficiently, employing minimum effort for maximum result.
Much as he’d ridden her.
Air shot from her lungs at the rogue thought entered her head. She had to shake herself round fast, and then she realised that Dante had turned his horse and was coming back for her.
‘What are you waiting for?’ he demanded. ‘Reminiscing?’
‘No. Thinking forward,’ she argued firmly.
‘About?’
‘About the work we have to do, and the short time we have to complete it in.’
‘You have to complete it in,’ he stressed with a look. ‘If you’re having second thoughts about your ability to handle a project as big as this one, you’d better let me know right away.’
‘I’m not having second thoughts.’ She met his demanding stare head on. ‘I’ll get this job done in good time, and it will be something we can both be proud of.’
‘It isn’t enough for me that you get it done. I expect more from you than that. And as for me being proud?’ He frowned. ‘It’s more important to me that I feel passion coming from you where this job is concerned. I want you to inspire the people who visit my ranch. That’s the only way you’ll make something memorable out of this.’
‘It will be memorable.’ She matched him with all her old fire.
‘That’s all I need to hear,’ Dante confirmed, turning away.
She watched him ride off, marvelling that she had ever been so young and naïve as to believe they would stay together just because they’d slept together. Anything had seemed possible on that magical night. Consequences hadn’t even crossed her mind. Dante had made her feel so safe.
Had he?
Wasn’t it more likely that she had embroidered the facts to fit her fantasy version of a relationship with Dante? Everything about that night had been reckless—from the flimsy dress she had chosen to wear, to her dancing and then their lovemaking. An eighteenth birthday was supposed to mark the transition from childhood to adulthood, but she’d
had to take everything to the edge. The validation of everything she’d been, and everything she’d hoped to be, had seemed to lie in the hands of one man—until Dante had thrown her out. Which she now understood had probably been a good thing, though it hadn’t seemed so at the time.
Good, because everything since that moment had made her face up to the fact that it was up to her to make her own fate, search out her own opportunities and her own path through life. Before the party she had still believed in fairy tales, and had saved herself for Dante. She had taken what had been a childhood friendship and changed it in her mind into true love, believing she’d touched him somewhere deep.
It had been a real slap in the face to discover that she hadn’t touched Dante anywhere. He had a deadline to keep, he had told her that night as he’d stared pointedly at the floor where her clothes lay scattered. He’d told her to pick them up and get out. She could still remember her shock as she’d stared at him numbly, trying to work out what she’d done wrong. ‘Take a shower and get out,’ he’d barked as she’d scooped up her clothes as if he couldn’t wait to get rid of her. She remembered holding them against her body, feeling suddenly ashamed of her nakedness.
‘Why are you frowning?’ Dante demanded, jerking her out of her recollections.
If love were a fairy tale, Dante had got the frog and prince thing completely wrong!
‘Are you going to dismount and let your horse drink?’ he prompted.
She sprang down to the ground before he could help her out of the saddle. She didn’t want to risk him touching her.
‘I’d like your opinion on this living accommodation...’
She refocused rapidly to take in the block of luxury apartments in front of them, and then realised they had ridden down a pathway flanked by the most beautiful gardens.
‘This is spectacular,’ she gasped, as she stared around. ‘It’s like an oasis in the desert. It’s ideal for what we need. Can we go inside and take a closer look?’
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