Cinderella's Christmas Secret (Mills & Boon Modern)

by Sharon Kendrick

  Feeling suddenly light-hearted, she made herself a sandwich and sat down at the table munching it as she looked around. Her little pine tree was wilting and had deposited most of its needles onto the rug, and two of the baubles had fallen to the floor. Christmas really was over and she was going to have to think about taking all these decorations down before Twelfth Night.

  She was just about to leave for work next morning, when she heard her phone vibrate and she slid it out of her handbag to look at it.

  It was a number she didn’t recognise. An international number—Spanish, she thought. And when she clicked on the call she discovered it was Cristina, the woman she’d met at Javier’s party. The woman with the potential to be a new friend. The blonde in the green dress.

  ‘Hi,’ said Hollie, a smile entering her voice. ‘How lovely to hear from you! How are you?’

  ‘I’m...well. You have returned to England, I think?’

  ‘That’s right. I’m just about to go to work. I’m flying back at the beginning of February.’

  Cristina’s accented voice dipped by a fraction. ‘And Maximo. Is he there with you?’

  ‘No, I’m afraid he’s not. He’s coming over at the weekend.’

  ‘I see.’ There was a pause. ‘I understand you’re pregnant, Hollie? I really should have congratulated you at the party.’

  ‘Yes, I am.’ Hollie felt her heart give a little kick. ‘I’m twelve weeks along. The scan is on Wednesday.’

  There was another pause but this time, Cristina’s voice sounded different. It quivered with the air of somebody who knew something. More specifically, who knew something you didn’t.

  ‘I like you, Hollie,’ she said slowly. ‘And I have learned something which is difficult for me to tell you, but which I feel you ought to know.’

  ‘You’re scaring me now,’ said Hollie, only half joking. ‘What is it?’

  ‘It’s about Maximo.’ There was a pause. ‘About the real reason he’s marrying you.’

  It was an extraordinary thing for someone to say out of the blue like that—especially someone who didn’t know you—and for a moment Hollie’s only response was silence. Her fingers tightened around the handset and she could feel her throat constrict. She felt faintly disappointed. As if she had misjudged Cristina, who perhaps didn’t want to be her friend at all. If she were a different kind of person she might have frostily retorted that it wasn’t any of the other woman’s business. But she wasn’t going to hide from the truth, and if Cristina was expressing what everyone else was thinking, then maybe the subject would be better addressed head-on. ‘I’m not naïve enough to believe the wedding would be happening if I weren’t pregnant,’ she said quietly.

  ‘I’m sure you’re not. But he’s not just marrying you in order to maintain respectability,’ Cristina said, and then the words came out in a rush, as if she was embarrassed to repeat them. ‘He’s marrying you because he stands to inherit the family business, which will be put in trust for your child. Only the will stipulates that the child must be born within wedlock.’

  Hollie froze.

  But Maximo had been estranged from his father since the age of fourteen. He’d told her that.

  With her free hand, she gripped the back of a nearby chair. ‘I don’t believe you,’ she whispered.

  ‘I’m afraid it’s true, my dear,’ said Cristina. ‘I heard this through Beatriz, one of his stepsisters. It was a hotly contested clause in the will, although the lawyers assured them it was watertight. They are obviously angry that their father’s illegitimate son stands to inherit one of the most profitable companies in Spain. I’m sorry, Hollie. I felt it best you should know, but this is not news I would ever wish to be the bearer of.’

  ‘No. Thank you.’ Hollie’s voice was brisk now. Polite, even. ‘I appreciate it, Cristina.’

  With a few more robotic words she cut the call, though all the time she was berating herself. How stupid she had been. Sorrow clamped its way around her heart like a vice and then she gave a bitter laugh. She might have lost her virginity but that didn’t mean she wasn’t still laughably naïve, did it? She had stupidly imagined she had no illusions about the opposite sex, but it seemed she was still capable of being blinded by the stars which had temporarily danced in front of her eyes. She had wanted love so badly that she had been prepared to overlook what was blazingly obvious. Because she didn’t know Maximo at all, not really. The man she saw was the man she had wanted to see, not the one with hidden depths which he kept concealed from her. He was marrying her to gain control of one of Spain’s most successful companies. Of course he was. Although he certainly didn’t need the money, maybe he felt it was a justified legacy—to make up for his father’s rejection. Payback time. But it didn’t alter one key and painful fact...

  That he had betrayed her, just as her father had betrayed her mother.

  Her knees felt weak and she gripped the back of the chair even harder, afraid they might buckle. But the weirdest thing was that after that moment of dizziness had passed, Hollie felt calm. Icy calm. Almost as if she had been expecting this. As if things had always been too good to be true.

  Because they were, weren’t they?

  Plenty of women got pregnant without getting married. Did she really think that someone like Maximo Diaz would ask someone like her to be his wife if he didn’t stand to gain something from it, especially when he’d told her right from the start he didn’t want a baby? Or had she walked into the self-deceptive trap of thinking they had something special between them, just because she’d fallen in love with him?

  She had fallen in love with him.

  Well, more fool her.

  He stands to inherit the family business. Cristina’s words were branded on Hollie’s brain like fire.

  If he’d told her himself, she might have understood. If he’d said Look, this baby means that I can get something I’ve always lusted after, she probably could have accepted it. If he’d kept it coldly businesslike from the beginning, then perhaps she wouldn’t have built up all those fantasies in her head. But he hadn’t and that had given her imagination a free rein. No wonder she thought she’d seen a look of triumph on his face when he’d asked if they could announce the pregnancy. He was probably rubbing his hands with glee at the thought of all that new power.

  She picked up her phone, turning it over and over in her hand before finally tapping her fingers over the keypad. It took longer than it should have done but that was because her hands were trembling so much. She kept the message short—because, really, it all boiled down to one simple fact whichever way you looked at it.

  Maximo...

  A tear dripped onto the back of her hand and, impatiently, she shook it away before continuing to type.

  Being back in Devon has given me a bit of time to reflect on things and I just don’t think it’s going to work out between us.

  Her finger hovered as she battled between the desire to put as much distance between them as possible and the knowledge that she needed to act like a grown-up.

  If you like we can talk in a couple of days. Hollie.

  She didn’t put any kisses, and that drove home the realisation that there had never been any of the stuff which defined most normal love affairs. No letters or texts of undying devotion. Just sex and a baby and a big diamond ring. She thought about the turrets and towers of Kastelloes and the thick snow which had trapped them there. She remembered how grateful she had been to that inclement weather, because it had brought her into Maximo’s arms. She’d been blown away by her Spanish lover, and hopeful when he’d opened up his heart to her. The world had felt tinged with magic, when all the time...

  All the time he had been using their marriage as a way of getting his hands on the family business.

  What a trusting fool she had been.

  Well, not any more.

  She had once told Maximo that sh
e could do all this on her own and she would—with or without his financial assistance. Because anything would be preferable to a lifetime of deceit.

  She tugged the heavy ring from her finger and it clattered as she put it on the table and then, letting out a shuddered breath, she laid her face against her cradled arms and wept.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  A THIN DRIZZLE of rain coated the windscreen in a slimy film as the car turned into the wintry English road. Maximo eased his foot off the accelerator, bringing the powerful vehicle almost to a halt so that it crept along at a snail’s pace. He stared fixedly ahead, not caring if he was wasting time. Because he needed time to work out what he was going to do. To assemble his whirling thoughts into some sort of order before he saw Hollie.

  To say what?

  He still didn’t know.

  He thought about the bald little message he had received from her.

  I just don’t think it’s going to work out between us...

  He had been taken aback by the dark surge of pain which had flooded through him.

  He had wanted to lift the phone and demand to know what had made her write it, but something made him change his mind—though he didn’t stop to think what that might be. Instead, he sought a solution in action, because that was how he operated. He had ordered his jet to be made ready and within hours had flown into Exeter airport, planning his movements with the precision of a cat burglar.

  Unobserved, he had watched Hollie leave the office and a wave of relief had swamped him as he’d seen her familiar figure walking towards the bus stop. And although every part of him had ached to drive up and tell her to get in the car, he’d resisted the powerful temptation to do so, because he didn’t want any kind of confrontation or public spectacle. He didn’t want to run the risk of her refusing to travel with him.

  He had seen the chill wind blowing at her hair, but the tresses were no longer unfettered and free as he liked them. They had been tamed beneath a hat he’d never seen her wear before, and the coat she was huddling into was not one of the items he had bought her, but a well-worn relic from her old wardrobe. It was as if she had embraced her old life and cut him out completely, he thought, and his heart gave another painful clench as he increased the speed of the car.

  Once he had vowed never to let a woman close enough to hurt him. What had happened to that fervent vow from which he had never wavered? The vow he’d made on his knees on that snowy Christmas Eve in Spain, all those years ago.

  You could leave now while there’s still time, a cold and pragmatic voice in his head reminded him.

  But he ignored it.

  His car slid to a halt outside her tiny cottage and he crunched his way up the gravel path. Ignoring the twee little bell which dangled in the porch, he lifted his arm and began to pound on the door and the mighty sound created by his fist echoed through the still night air.

  Someone was knocking at her door and Hollie paused in the middle of washing up her teacup. No, it was more like a pounding. The sound which someone who was in a hurry—or a temper—would make. Someone autocratic and powerful who wouldn’t think twice about making enough noise to wake the dead.

  Her throat dried. There was only one person she knew who would knock like that. Was that why her heart started racing as she put her teacup down and headed for the door? Or was it just that deep down she’d been expecting this visit and now the moment had arrived, she felt a terrible fatalistic sorrow washing over her?

  Drawing in a deep breath, she pulled open the door and there stood Maximo. His hair was windswept and he was dressed in the black clothes which were so familiar, but Hollie had never seen that expression on his face before. It was tense. Brittle. As if he were holding something dark and unwanted inside him. His eyes narrowed, and then he spoke.

  ‘Can I come in, please, Hollie?’

  Did he really think she would refuse him entry? That she would want to? Because even though she recognised that the final minutes of their relationship were ticking away, Hollie wasn’t feeling the things she wanted to feel. Despite the fact that he had used her as a pawn in his ambitious game plan, she wasn’t hating him, or not fancying him. Her stupid stomach still turned to mush when he brushed past her, forcing her to shut the door on the drizzly evening outside.

  For a minute she was tempted to throw herself into his arms in an effort to blot out all those things she’d discovered. Or even to ask if he’d like some coffee after his long journey, in a futile desire to put off the inevitable. To act as if she were still going to be his wife and make like they were going to be a happy family.

  But she couldn’t do that any more. She couldn’t pretend—not to him—not even to herself.

  Especially not to herself.

  Uncharacteristically, he seemed almost hesitant as his gaze swept over her. ‘Is the baby okay?’

  Of course that would be his number one concern. ‘Everything’s fine,’ she answered briskly. ‘I’m having the scan the day after tomorrow.’

  There was a pause, and now the light from his eyes was very hard and very bright. ‘Do you want to tell me why you sent that text?’

  Hollie tried to think of the right words but there were no right words. Only wrong ones. Harsh, discordant words which had the power to destroy everything and now she was going to have to say them out loud and make it all real.

  ‘Do you want to tell me why you asked me to marry you, Maximo?’ she questioned quietly. ‘Only give me the real reason this time!’

  His frown deepened. ‘But you know the reason.’

  ‘Yes, of course I do. Because of the baby. Or so I thought. We were supposed to be completely honest with each other, weren’t we? We said that truth was going to define our relationship. Yet all the time...’ She swallowed. ‘All the time there was this great big secret bubbling away in the background, which you failed to mention.’

  ‘What secret?’ he echoed. ‘You’ve completely lost me now.’

  ‘Please don’t treat me like an idiot!’ she snapped.

  ‘Then why don’t you stop speaking in riddles? I told you. I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  ‘I’m talking about inheriting your father’s business!’

  He shook his head. ‘Nope. Still confused.’

  His words sounded genuine but Hollie steeled her heart against them, because men could lie, couldn’t they? In fact, men did lie. Her father had rarely spoken a true word in his life, according to her mother.

  ‘Cristina rang me up. The blonde in the green dress at the party,’ she continued. ‘She knows your stepsister, Beatriz.’ She heard his sudden sharp intake of breath, which she interpreted as guilt.

  ‘Beatriz,’ he said slowly. ‘Well, well, well. Now it really does get interesting.’

  Hollie sucked in a ragged breath. ‘Cristina told me about the will. About how your father left you controlling shares of his business, but only if you have a child born within wedlock. So why didn’t you tell me that, Maximo? If you’d told me the truth in the first place then maybe I could have lived with it. It’s the lies I can’t stand.’

  But there was no guilt or resignation on his face. No sense of having been found out. In fact, there was nothing on his sculpted features but a look of growing comprehension.

  ‘This is all news to me, Hollie,’ he said slowly. ‘If there is such a bequest then it has never been on my radar, because I have been estranged from my family for many years and in all that time I haven’t spoken to my stepsisters—not since they decided that cruelty towards an impressionable young boy was a sport they relished.’ His voice harshened. ‘Do you really think I would conceal something like that from you?’

  ‘Yes! If you want the truth, yes, I do!’

  Maximo flinched as if she had hit him, but through the slow burn of injustice came a powerful rush of feelings. Uncomfortable feelings he had buried for years an
d if it had been anyone else, he would have slammed his way out of there and taken his outraged pride with him.

  But this wasn’t just anyone. This was Hollie. Hollie who knew more about him than anyone else did. He remembered when he’d told her about working on the roads as a teenager and she’d asked him if he had lied about his age, as if it was important. As if it had meant something. Because it did mean something. She was used to men lying to her. Her father, for one. Did she think he was cast out of the same mould and that he would deceive her about something as big as this?

  And then he wondered how he dared be such a hypocrite. Why wouldn’t she believe that, when he had done nothing but push her away since she’d arrived in Spain, and maybe even before that? He had been so damned keen to create barriers between them and to ensure she knew never to dare cross them, that he had succeeded in destroying all the ease and the intimacy which had once existed between them. And now she was looking at him warily, with sadness and mistrust written all over her lovely face, and although he knew he deserved all of that—and more—suddenly he couldn’t bear the thought that he might have sabotaged, not just his own future, but that of his family. His family with her.

  ‘I repeat, I knew nothing about this legacy, and even if I did, do you really think I’d want his damned business? If I had, I might have stayed on in that heartless mansion—enduring the taunts of my stepsisters and the sniggers of the servants who surrounded him. Do you really think that even if I were poor—even if I were poor—I would accept the charity of someone who had never wanted me during his lifetime? Do you, Hollie?’

  The fierceness of his tone must have convinced her, for she gave a brief and reluctant shrug. ‘I guess not.’

  But the wariness was still there and Maximo knew he had a long way to go. He could feel his jaw hardening—locking so tight he could scarcely grit the next words out, but then he’d had a whole lifetime of suppressing stuff instead of articulating it.

  ‘I didn’t lie to you about the will,’ he said slowly. ‘But in a way, I was lying to myself.’