The Spaniard's Love-Child

by Kim Lawrence

  As if sensing his silent condemnation the diminutive redhead lifted her hand to push back the mesh of red-gold waves from a heart-shaped face. Raul, his attention momentarily diverted, was struck by the extreme slenderness of her small-boned wrist.

  Her hands, like her bare feet, were narrow and small, and, wearing those slightly ridiculous oversized pyjamas emblazoned with teddy bears, she didn’t actually look very much older or sophisticated than his rebellious niece. The woman seemed to possess chameleon-like qualities, but Raul knew Nell Rose could look very different.

  His mind drifted back to the day he had seen her on the beach with his brother. Her sleek, rounded curves had been revealed in a bikini of petite and provocative proportions. He had watched as she had stretched with lazy feline grace in the sun before rolling over to whisper something in his brother’s ear.

  Javier’s reply had made her set off down the beach with him in hot pursuit. He had caught up with her at the water’s edge. Raul had been able to hear her laughs and screams as Javier had picked her up, from where he had been standing in the sand dunes. When Javier had strode into the sea until they’d both been immersed by the waves, he had turned and walked swiftly away.

  It had been painful for him to see the brother he’d admired and respected making a fool of himself over a girl who’d been so obviously out for what she could get. A girl who’d been far too young for him. He’d only considered for a split second the clearly preposterous possibility that what had actually bothered him was the fact that Javier had seemed to be having so much fun being a fool.

  On the day of the funeral she had looked much more demure, but Raul had known what sort of woman lurked behind the modest suit and sweetly sad expression. The few tendrils of hair that had escaped the severe chignon had been bright against the back of the slim-fitting suit she had worn, the light application of blusher along her cheekbones had served to emphasise her extreme pallor.

  Raul’s expression hardened as he dragged his mind back to the present and his eyes back to her face. Someone lacking his knowledge of her history would have been unable to reconcile this unsophisticated figure before him with a young woman who had at eighteen cleverly inveigled her way into a recently bereaved man’s home, bed and heart. To be able to disguise such ruthless self-interest behind a guileless façade would be truly an asset, he decided cynically.

  ‘Miss Rose…’

  Did she, he wondered, cultivate that candid and rather unnervingly direct blue gaze? He saw an expression of impatience flicker in the cornflower-blue eyes; his own eyes narrowed.

  Raul was not unnerved, nor even intrigued by the wide-eyed stuff. His glance slid dismissively over the suggestion of slight curves beneath the voluminous nightgear. No doubt there were men whose chivalrous instincts were aroused by such fragility, but his instincts, protective or otherwise, were not excited by this style of delicate vulnerability.

  ‘Keep your voice down,’ she hissed, glancing over her shoulder.

  Raul, unaccustomed to being on the other end of an order, stiffened in astonishment to hear the terse note of command in her low-pitched voice.

  ‘Are the children ready?’

  ‘No, they’re not.’ Nell smiled to take the sting out of her admission as she struggled to maintain her composure, at least outwardly.

  Inside she did not have the luxury of pretence; the instant she had laid eyes on him standing there like some avenging angel on her doorstep every protective instinct she possessed had awoken. So had a lot of other instincts, but Nell couldn’t see that dwelling on those was going to help the present situation.

  She was frustrated by the inherent weakness responsible for her turbulent pulse-rate and unsteady hands, but not surprised by it. There was nothing subtle about what Raul Carreras oozed, unless you considered being hit over the head by a large blunt object subtle! And Nell seriously doubted if her response to his brand of raw sexuality made her in any way unique.

  ‘I thought I had made my wishes clear.’

  It was obvious from his tone that it had not for one second even crossed his mind that anyone would ignore an instruction he had given, no matter how misjudged said instruction might be.

  ‘You did,’ she agreed placidly. ‘But I thought it wasn’t a good idea,’ she elaborated.

  Raul stared at her. ‘You thought…?’

  Was he outraged at the idea she could think, or the fact she had dared think something he didn’t want her to? It was his expression of total astonishment that made her annoyance tip over into amusement.

  Her grin produced a predictable gleam of awakening anger in his deep-set eyes—this was not a man to whom laughing at himself came easily. Nell arranged her features in a suitably sober expression. There was no point deliberately antagonising him and, she reminded herself, his night had been even more hellish than her own. Under the circumstances the guy was allowed not to be in the mood to party or even smile, she thought, studying his magnificently brooding profile. God, but he really was something extra special.

  Being a fair-minded person, Nell knew that if he’d been anyone else she’d have automatically cut him a bit of slack without a second thought. The problem was he wasn’t anyone else. The fact is, she told herself, you can’t allow your judgement to be clouded by his sexual charisma. You couldn’t hold a man personally responsible for looking like your fantasy dream lover and then compounding the crime by ruining the illusion when he opened his mouth.

  Maybe that was just as well, she reflected ruefully; if his personality had turned out to be as sublimely perfect as his raw, rampantly male looks, the fact he was totally unattainable to someone like herself would have been seriously tragic.

  The thought of how unspeakably awful it must have been for him to think, even temporarily, that the children had been snatched brought a sympathetic warmth to her expression of which she was totally unaware as she read her hormones a firm lecture on self-control.

  ‘Look, I really don’t think you’ve thought this through,’ she told him kindly. ‘Why don’t we talk about it? Would you like to come in?’ She stepped a little to one side.

  ‘There is nothing to think through and I should like to take the children back home in my car, which is no doubt being vandalised.’

  His continued inexplicable antagonism was beginning to really niggle her. ‘Oh, it’s your car you’re worried about.’ She regretted the childish retort the moment it escaped her lips. ‘And here was me thinking it was Kate and Antonio,’ she finished in defiance of his glowering disapproval.

  One strongly delineated dark brow lifted. ‘Frankly, Miss Rose, I do not think my worries are any of your concern.’ His fine nostrils quivered as he looked contemptuously down his patrician nose at her.

  His dismissive attitude brought a flush to Nell’s cheeks. For someone she associated with emotional detachment, there was something inescapably personal about the unconcealed contempt in his voice and manner.

  A natural optimist, blessed with an easygoing nature, Nell had managed to go through life without making enemies. Finding herself on the receiving end of such hostility wasn’t pleasant. Did he treat everyone this way or was she receiving special treatment? She didn’t crave Raul Carreras’s approval, but if his antipathy was personal it wasn’t going to help her advocacy of the children’s case.

  ‘Kate and Antonio are my concern though.’ The mystery was no longer why Katerina had run away from her uncle, but why it had taken her so long! Imagining her own fate in the hands of such a man sent a shiver down Nell’s spine.

  The grim smile that curved his wide, sensual mouth was without humour as he coldly replied, ‘Thankfully that is not true.’ Nell opened her mouth to contradict him, but was forestalled by his smooth and astonishing addition. ‘You are my dead brother’s ex-mistress, a position I think you’ll find will carry very little weight legally or otherwise.’

  Mistress!

  Now the explanation for his attitude had revealed itself Nell didn’t know why she wa
s so astounded, or why this possibility hadn’t occurred to her earlier. It wasn’t as if this were the first time some ill-informed person had assumed Javier and she had been lovers.

  Even though it seemed laughably preposterous to her, if she thought about it objectively Nell could see how they got there. They had shared a house, not had other partners and, despite the age gap, Javier had been a very attractive man, though not admittedly in the same class as his younger brother.

  But then who was?

  Nell scanned the lean, dark and permanently bad-tempered features of Raul Carreras from under the protective shield of her lashes. He might be an overbearing pain, but there was no denying the man really did have raw sex appeal coming out of his pores. As gorgeous as he was to look at, in Nell’s eyes his staggering beauty didn’t compensate for him being a humourless, stuck-up bully.

  A thoughtful expression on her face, she tried to figure out how he had come to the conclusion she and Javier had been lovers. Though she had never personally met the man up until the day of the funeral she did know that he and Javier had met up infrequently. Nell could recall thinking it was touching when she had learnt that Javier’s younger brother had broken ranks and did have contact with the estranged member of the family.

  Had Javier said something during one of their infrequent meetings that his brother had misinterpreted? If he had realised, Javier, who had been extremely protective of her reputation, would no doubt have put him straight. Javier on the surface, unorthodox and caring little for convention, actually never stopped being essentially a Spanish male, and as such he held some quaintly old-fashioned ideas about a woman’s reputation. He had been much more concerned about what people might think than she had been.

  As far as Nell herself was concerned the people that mattered knew the only interest Javier had in her was mildly paternal, and, besides, the sort of people that thought ill of her were not the sort of people she cared much about anyway.

  ‘It has been a trying evening, Miss Rose. I think you’ll find it is imprudent to try my patience.’

  Nell’s dazed gaze focused openly on his dark face. Nell didn’t have much practice at hating but in that split second as their eyes meshed the dislike she felt for him hardened into something far more implacable than mere dislike. Raul Carreras was not the sort of man who inspired tepid emotions.

  Until that moment she had fully intended to set him straight, but that changed too. Her full mouth arranged itself into a mutinous line. Let him think what he liked; she didn’t owe him any explanation.

  ‘Is that a threat?’ she enquired quietly.

  ‘It is a statement of fact.’

  ‘Will you lower your voice? I have neighbours, you know.’

  ‘I would have thought that in an area such as this noise is the least of the neighbours’ problems.’ Every time Raul thought of the children walking through such an area in the middle of the night his blood ran cold.

  ‘Why, you snob!’ she exclaimed contemptuously.

  A muscle clenched in his lean cheek as Raul studied her angry face with an air of baffled frustration. He ran a hand down the back of his sleek dark hair before rubbing it along the stubble that dusted his angular jawline.

  ‘Would you be happy to walk alone here at night?’

  ‘I have done.’ No need to mention she had not done so out of choice and had been extremely uneasy.

  ‘Then you are a fool,’ he condemned.

  No, just a liar. ‘You’re entitled to your opinion.’ And don’t you enjoy sharing it?

  ‘I am willing to overlook your involvement in tonight’s events,’ he revealed in the manner of someone making a major concession. ‘However, there are limits to my patience,’ he revealed in a colourless, bored tone.

  ‘Involvement?’ she queried sharply. ‘Listen, I realise having someone to blame means you don’t have to examine your own behaviour, but I didn’t volunteer to be your scapegoat.’

  ‘I am not suggesting you planned what happened.’

  Planned? Good God! Was that what he was thinking? ‘That’s terribly good of you,’ she choked with leaden irony.

  ‘You expect me to believe you didn’t plant the idea in Katerina’s head? Oh, I’m sure you were subtle,’ he conceded nastily. ‘A word here, a word there…’ His eyes narrowed suspiciously. ‘I don’t know what you think you’ll gain from exploiting the fondness my niece and nephew have for you? However, I think you should remember that I am not my brother.’

  As if I’m likely to forget! ‘You’re suggesting?’ Nell swallowed and shook her head, feeling the anger building steadily inside her.

  ‘My brother obviously had a fondness for you, I don’t,’ he spelt out coldly. ‘If these children come to any harm because of you, you will answer to me. Oh…’ he smiled grimly into her pale face ‘…in case you were wondering, that was a threat.’

  ‘You’re suggesting that I encouraged them to run away?’ Her voice rose to a shrill pitch, which made him wince. ‘I’d really like to be around when you realise just how much you’ve underestimated Katerina.’ And if he was half as patronising to the teenager as he was with her he wouldn’t have to wait long, she thought grimly.

  ‘Do not try and deflect the blame,’ he recommended scornfully.

  ‘I’m not!’ Nell exclaimed angrily. ‘I just meant that you don’t begin to appreciate just how resourceful and bright Katerina is.’ Or how much she needs someone to love her, she thought sadly.

  ‘I am aware that Katerina is an intelligent child; however,’ he added disapprovingly, ‘she lacks focus.’

  ‘She didn’t lack focus when she knocked out your security.’ Nell watched a look of genuine shock chase across his dark, devastating features.

  ‘Katerina?’ Raul, scepticism etched on his lean, dark features, shook his head. ‘It is not possible.’

  Nell smiled and Raul’s jaw tightened.

  ‘I blame myself for not putting a stop to the phone calls and e-mails.’ He placed a hand on the doorjamb above her head.

  Hot with hating, Nell lifted her shimmering eyes to his and without warning was submerged by a wave of enervating lust so intense she couldn’t breathe. It hurt; it physically hurt. Nell, unable to tear her eyes from Raul’s face, couldn’t have said whether she was standing, sitting or lying down. Praying for things to return to normal, she fought to control her rising panic.

  It was the cringe-inducing possibility that he was not unaware of the effect his physical closeness had on her that enabled Nell to assume an attitude of defiance even when his voice dropped to a soft, threatening murmur that made the hairs on her nape stand on end.

  ‘But I intend to rectify that error.’

  ‘By allowing me no contact with them? You wouldn’t be that cruel?’ The sweat that had broken out on the surface of her skin was cooling; it wasn’t a nice feeling.

  She watched one dark brow lift to a satiric angle.

  ‘Your confidence in my essential kindness is flattering, but misplaced.’

  ‘That’s nothing to boast about,’ she remonstrated tartly.

  There was a fulminating silence punctuated by the sound of his inhalation.

  ‘It is clear to me,’ Raul added in an icy voice, ‘that without your influence they would have settled down into their new life by now.’

  Nell regarded him with open incredulity. ‘Not even you can believe that.’

  ‘Certainly I believe that,’ he rebutted from between clenched teeth.

  Was it her imagination or was that a defensive note she was hearing in his voice?

  ‘How can they recover when you are constantly raking up the past?’ he said harshly.

  ‘You mean I talk about their father? They need to talk about him. I need to talk about him,’ she added huskily. She turned her head away, blinking furiously as she felt her eyes flood with sudden tears. When she felt she had regained enough control to meet his gaze she discovered he was looking at her with a bewildering, angry intensity.

  ‘T
hey can talk about Javier to me.’

  ‘You didn’t know him.’ Nell heard his harsh intake of breath and gave a penitent grimace. ‘Not that that was really your fault.’

  ‘Save your empathy; I’m not about to change my mind. It’s obvious that you exert a considerable and undesirable influence on the children.’

  ‘You’re calling me undesirable?’

  ‘Undesirable…?’

  Something in his voice, something she couldn’t quite pin down, made her study his face with extra attention. She watched his long jet lashes lift from his incredible eyes and for a split second their eyes locked. The white heat in his eyes made Nell recoil. She was totally unconscious of the tiny gasp that escaped her parted lips.

  ‘Just take me to the children,’ he rasped.

  Nell barely registered him brush past her as she continued to stare blankly at the space he had occupied moments earlier. Despite the core of heat low in her belly, she shivered. Primitive and explicitly sexual—the look in his incredible eyes had been both, and it had been directed at her! They said hate and love were closely related; perhaps the same could be said for hate and lust?

  CHAPTER FOUR

  IT WAS a little while before the suffocating excitement had receded enough for Nell to regain control of herself. She walked into the flat and found all but one of the doors leading off the sitting room open; Raul had his hand on the handle of the one that still remained closed.

  ‘What do you think you’re—? You can’t go in there!’ She caught him by the arm but wasn’t quick enough to stop him pushing open the door into her bedroom. His impetuous stride stilled as he saw the two children asleep on the bed, Antonio under the covers and Katerina lying on top with Nell’s dressing gown and a fleece throw arranged over her sleeping figure.

  Raul froze; Nell saw his chest rise as he inhaled sharply. His head turned towards her and as their eyes met her own hand fell self-consciously from his arm. His expression was unreadable as he turned and stared at the sleeping children. How, she wondered, did you take the measure of a man who hid his feelings so well? Well, not always, she thought, recalling with a shudder the raw hunger she had glimpsed in his eyes.