The Spaniard's Woman - Contemporary Romance (3 page)

But if she told him that she didn’t have that kind of relationship with Grady, Gabriel would demand to know what she was doing with him and Rhianna had no desire to go into the details of her life, not when one of those details was currently sleeping at home, dreaming little boy dreams...

Rhianna retreated into righteous indignation. ‘I don’t think that’s any of your business.’

‘It
is
none of my business,’ he agreed. That deep, dark voice with its attractively accented English was still as sexy as hell. Rhianna tried not to think of all the times she had lain in his arms, eyes closed, letting it wash over her. Being this close to him was stirring all kinds of memories she had managed to suppress for years. ‘But I am curious; how does a man such as that satisfy you,
mi
Rhianna?’ His voice dropped several notches, moving down into that sultry, seductive range that brought a shiver of heightened awareness sliding down her spine, ‘I remember just how much you enjoyed making love with me. The touch of my hands to arouse you into a frenzy of feeling so that you forgot everything except what I was doing to -’

‘Stop it!’ Her feet faltered. Rhianna stared up at him, white faced. ‘You have no right to speak to me like that.’

‘I was your first lover,’ he reminded her coolly, ‘I have often wondered who you found to replace me.’

His callous indifference to her distress was exactly what she would have expected from him. Had Gabriel ever cared for her or had he just accepted her blind devotion as his right, the right of a wellborn Spanish nobleman to be idolized by a woman? Rhianna was silent for a moment, trying to pull herself together. Thankfully, the music came to an end. Immediately, she pulled herself from his arms and spoke through stiff lips. ‘Thank-you for the dance, Senor Ortega.’

He shook his head. ‘Another is beginning. You will dance with me again.’

Once again, it wasn’t a request but a command but Rhianna wasn’t about to allow him to have his own way a second time. ‘I need to go back to Grady.’ she said, taking a hasty step away from as he advanced towards her, ‘I will bid you goodnight.’

But he was not done yet, following along behind. ‘Does Grady know we were lovers once?’

‘Grady knows everything there is to know about me,’ she replied flatly. It was true enough. She had written to him from Europe, telling him about her travels. That was before he had had the accident. She had even told her old high-school sweetheart about the special man she had met in Girona. Typically, Grady had been far from impressed, both by her raptures and by the difference in their age and respective positions in life. Gabriel Ortega was ten years older than her and belonged to one of the wealthiest families in Catalonia. How could she possibly think something like that could work?

Of course, he’d had a point but Rhianna had been blinded by love and she’d thought anything was possible. In her head it had seemed obvious that Gabriel would marry her. That they would have a family together and settle down to a life of unparalleled bliss. Rhianna’s lips twisted bitterly at the thought of how very naive she had been. Gabriel had never thought of her as anything but his mistress, an amusing distraction that could be discarded when he had to get on with his real life. ‘Is your wife with you, Senor Ortega?’

There was a pause. Rhianna turned her head to look at Gabriel and saw a brief flash of... something on his face. It was gone in a moment, replaced by his more habitual expression of cool reserve. ‘No, Rhianna. She is not.’

So Gabriel was in the country by himself – or with whoever his mistress of the moment was. Rhianna wondered what had brought him to Australia and - more importantly - when he would leave. In the normal course of events she would never have run across him; Grady’s company dealt in technology and the Ortega’s had no business interests that would have brought them to O’Farrell Industries. They were an old Spanish family with old Spanish money. The concept of anything as sordid as industry touching the Ortega’s was inconceivable.

Catching her arm, Gabriel swung her back to face him. ‘This is unsatisfactory. Tell your lover that you will join him later. I wish to talk to you further.’

Rhianna stared up at him, her breath uneven, incredulous that he would think he had any right to demand anything of her. ‘I don’t think Grady would like that and I’m certain that I wouldn’t. I have nothing to say to you.’

The dark eyes narrowed. ‘So you keep telling me. I can understand your concern regarding your lover. If you were still my woman I would not like you speaking to another man either,’ he conceded. ‘But I think, under the circumstances, he will have to tolerate it.’

Rhianna trembled. She had no idea why Gabriel Ortega had decided that he must renew his acquaintance with her but she knew that she must somehow elude him. The more time he spent with her, the more chance he had to gather information about her life and there was one secret she had determined never to share with him. ‘What circumstances? We have nothing to discuss.’

His smile was wry. ‘I might have thought that too, until I saw you. But then I realized that we have a great deal to talk about, Rhianna
dulce
.’

Sweet Rhianna
... Something deep within her quivered a response to the endearment and fear shivered through her. She was
not
his sweet Rhianna, not any more. And there was no way on earth she would allow him back into her life. ‘Go away, Gabriel. Just leave me alone.’

He moved closer, his grip on her arm keeping her exactly where he wanted her. ‘Is that what you really want? Back on the dance floor it seemed that my body could recall yours very well, every movement familiar to me. I can feel your attraction to me, even as you try to send me away. Your body remembers what we shared together, Rhianna. It remembers how it was to make love with me.’

Blood pounded through her veins at the memories his words stirred; her body did indeed remember everything her head had tried to forget. She could recall all too clearly how intoxicating his lovemaking could be, the way he could set her on fire with his lightest caress... But thoughts like that were madness. ‘I don’t want to remember
anything
about our time together,’ she told him in a breathless undertone, conscious that they were receiving some curious looks from those around them. ‘I just want to be left alone.’

‘That, I fear, is impossible now.’ He shook his head, ‘It was unfortunate that you came here tonight Rhianna. Unfortunate for you, because now that I have seen you again I want what we once had.’ He ignored her involuntary murmur of protest, ‘Unfortunate for me, because I did not come here to re-ignite a relationship I had thought was gone. But plans change and destiny, it seems, intervenes.’ There was no escaping the assurance in his voice. He really did believe that he could simply walk back into her life and take up where he had left off. He dropped his grip on her arm but only so that his fingers could slide down the curve of her cheek, thumb pausing to rub lightly across the fullness of her bottom lip. ‘Now that I have seen you, I have only one thought in my head.’

‘Gabriel, stop it-’

‘I want to make love to you again. I want to feel that sweet body wrapped around me and have you drive away every thought in my head with your softness and your warmth. To lose myself in you completely...’ Rhianna stared up at him, momentarily mesmerized by the intensity in his eyes and in his words. ‘You will be mine again. It is inevitable. That man... I might regret taking you from him but he means nothing to me and soon, I will see to it that he means nothing to you.’ The hand slipped to the nape of her neck and she almost groaned as he stroked the flesh, remembering exactly where she was the most sensitive.

‘Rhianna.’

The voice seemed to come from a distance but it broke the spell that Gabriel appeared to have woven around her so effortlessly.
With just a touch and a few words
... Rhianna blinked up at Gabriel for a moment longer then stepped back as if she’d been burned. She looked around to find Grady behind her, frowning with irritation. ‘What the hell are you doing?’ he demanded.

Rhianna flushed. What
had
she been doing? ‘Leaving. Now,’ she said abruptly, moving to stand behind her boss as if he could offer her protection from the irresistible force that was Gabriel Ortega. ‘If you don’t mind.’

‘Fine by me,’ Grady grunted, giving Gabriel an unfriendly look.

Strangely, Gabriel made no move to stop them, something that surprised Rhianna considering his words. It wasn’t until she was in the car on the way home that she realized, with a cold shiver of apprehension, that Gabriel didn’t
need
to stop her.

With his money and connections, he’d have no trouble at all finding her again.

And there was no doubt in the world that he would come looking.

Chapter Three

‘Mommy, can we go down to the beach today? Can we?’

Rhianna glanced down at her son and smiled. It had been raining steadily for three days and he was sick of being cooped up in the house. She had finished everything that Grady had left for her to do and now, with the sun finally breaking through the clouds, was as good an opportunity as any to take Dylan for a breath of fresh air. Besides, getting out of the house would give her something else to think about apart from Gabriel Ortega.

She had spent the previous day in a lather of anxiety, expecting a knock on the door at any moment. Naturally Grady had quizzed her in the car about Gabriel and she had told him exactly who he was. Grady had been surprisingly supportive.

‘Dylan’s dad?’ He’d let out a whistle between his teeth. ‘That’s a bit if bad luck. Unless of course you want to tell him about Dylan -’

‘No
.’ Rhianna’s denial had been immediate and instinctive. She had absolutely no desire for Gabriel to know about their son. There was no telling how he would take the news and she simply couldn’t risk him arbitrarily deciding that he should be an active participant in Dylan’s life. She had no idea where she stood, but if Gabriel took it into his head to fight for legal custody of Dylan... Rhianna shuddered at the thought.

‘I don’t want Gabriel Ortega to know anything about Dylan,’ she’d told Grady tightly. ‘I don’t trust him not to try and take him away.’

‘He can’t do that,’ Grady objected, ‘When all’s said and done, Rhianna, you’re Dylan’s mother and there’s nothing that Ortega can do about it. Besides, you’re probably worrying unnecessarily. He’d have his own kids by now. Why would he be interested in Dylan?’

Rhianna was far from reassured. Gabriel probably did have his own child - or children - by now, but Dylan was his first-born and Spanish men had very strong views about the children they sired.
Especially
their sons.

And that didn’t even begin to address the matter of his sworn intention to bed her again...

That was something she’d chosen
not
to tell Grady. It was too private, too shameful to think of how readily her body had reacted to him, the images that had flooded her head so seductive that she had been swamped with a heady desire she hadn’t experience in years; not since her last night with Gabriel. How could she ever admit to anyone that the man who had disposed of her so carelessly could still make her ache with longing? She could barely admit it to herself.

She had hardly slept the previous night, plagued by her fears. Grady’s comfortable reassurances that he would help her dispose of Gabriel Ortega if he did happen to turn up comforted her not at all because Grady simply didn’t know the man. Gabriel was a human dynamo, so self-assured that he quite naturally swept everything before him, refusing to take no for an answer. Indeed, he’d probably never had anyone say no to him in his life. Rhianna had stared at the ceiling, unwilling to close her eyes because every time she did, Gabriel’s image superimposed itself instantly.

What kind of man decided to have an affair with a woman when he had a wife waiting for him back home? Even as she asked it, Rhianna knew it was a stupid question. She knew perfectly well that for the most part, Spanish nobility had no difficulty separating marriage and love. Keeping a wife and a mistress was such a common as to be hardly worth mentioning. When Gabriel had left Rhianna it was if the blinkers she had worn during their time together had fallen away from her eyes. She had thought that the extraordinary longing she felt for Gabriel would somehow change everything because how could two people share such incredible depths of passion without believing that they were meant to be together?

She had found out just how wrong she was, of course. And that naive young woman had transformed into a cautious creature that knew better than to believe in fairytales.

When the previous day had concluded without any sign of Gabriel, she had allowed herself to relax, just a little. It was possible, after all, that he had not known where to find her. Or that he had had second thoughts. Why would he want to re-ignite an affair with a woman he had once deemed unsuitable? With any luck he had reconsidered, deciding the past should remain the past, after all.

‘Mommy,’ Dylan’s voice, insistently demanding her attention. ‘Pleeeasse!’

‘Why not! Go grab a coat though. It’s going to be cold out there.’

Time spent outdoors blew the cobwebs away. Rhianna ran along the sand with her son, fed the seagulls and finished the outing off with a hotdog from the stand by the wharf. After two hours, Dylan was yawning his head off from the fresh air and activity and they headed for home.

Grady was still out by the time she returned. He’d gone into the city for another meeting with Edmund Bishop. By now it looked certain that he would obtain the lucrative contract to supply all of Bishop Enterprises new computer hardware. As this entailed several thousand workstations, winning the contract was a definite feather in Grady’s cap. Rhianna had been pleased to see how cheerful her employer had been over breakfast that morning, laughing and joking with Dylan which was unusual. Grady was
not
a morning person and the most they usually got from him were uncommunicative growls.

After tucking Dylan into bed for a nap, Rhianna decided to grab a quick shower to warm up. She was just slipping into her robe when there was a light tap on the door.

‘Yes?’

Enid Carstairs, the housekeeper, put her head around the door. ‘Visitor for you Rhianna. I popped him in the study.’

Rhianna froze for a moment.
A visitor.
.. She spoke from between lips that had suddenly gone dry. ‘Who... who is it Enid?’

‘He didn’t give his name but he’s a foreign gentleman.’ Catching Rhianna’s expression, Enid looked concerned. ‘Is everything all right dear?’

‘I...’ What to say? What
could
she say? Disaster had struck and the devil had walked in the door. Gabriel Ortega was in the house, waiting to her right now.
And their son was sleeping two rooms away
. Everything was completely and utterly wrong! She tried to collect herself. ‘Give me a minute. I’ll be right down.’ Somehow, she had to get him out of the house. ‘Oh, and Enid? I might have to... to go out for a while. Could you mind Dylan if I do?’

‘Always a pleasure,’ the woman assured her, although there was no mistaking the curiosity in the look she cast Rhianna. The housekeeper must think she behaving very oddly.

Rhianna got dressed, dragging on jeans and a black cotton sweater. Her hair hung down her back in a loose mass and she left it like that, uncaring of how she looked; in fact, she hoped she looked terrible. Gabriel Ortega had seen her dressed up for a night out but her day-to-day persona was very different. Perhaps when he caught sight of her he would realize that she wasn’t the alluring young woman she had once been.

She couldn’t have been more wrong. Five minutes later Gabriel looked around from the titles he had been studying in the bookcase and saw a woman that made his heart momentarily stand still. Far from appearing dowdy, Rhianna looked extraordinary lovely, her thick silvery hair hanging loose down her back, her skin still faintly flushed from the shower so that her cheeks were tinged with pink. She wore no makeup but then, she didn’t need anything to enhance her naturally pale beauty.

Gabriel sucked in a deep breath. It had taken him exactly twenty-four hours longer than he had anticipated to track Rhianna down and he his impatience had been an unfamiliar irritant. Now that she was standing before him again he had to fight down a sudden, overwhelming compulsion to walk across the room and claim that full, sensuous mouth with his own. On the drive over he had determined that he would be patient with her. While her body had told him that she was far from immune to him when they danced, there were other matters that must be dealt with if he was to achieve the outcome he desired; namely, Rhianna, in his life and in his bed once again.

She was staring at him as if he was the devil incarnate and he smiled. ‘My apologies for being late.’

Rhianna’s expression became even more cautious. ‘Late? I don’t remember inviting you in the first place.’

‘You didn’t,’ he admitted. ‘But you must have known I would come, just the same.’

Enid popped her head around the door. ‘Tea or coffee?’

Rhianna wanted to say that Gabriel wouldn’t be staying long enough to enjoy either but he preempted her, giving the housekeeper a charming smile. ‘That would be delightful. Coffee, if you please.’

Rhianna ground her teeth. So much for getting rid of him quickly. She tried to calculate in her head how long Dylan might sleep but there was no way of knowing. His romp on the beach had tired him out and he might sleep for several hours or he might wake at any minute and then he would come looking for her.

She had to get Gabriel out of the house!

Gabriel tilted his head, regarding her as a cat - a large, very dangerous cat - would its prey. ‘Are you going to hover by the door the entire time I am here?’ he inquired, ‘Will you not sit down, Rhianna? Look, I will take this chair so that the table is between us.’ And he sat in a chair on one side of the coffee table.

She knew he was mocking her, mocking her reluctance to go near him and she bit her lip, moving forward to take a seat, grateful that something separated them, although a table hardly seemed adequate. Something along the lines of a brick wall would have been more welcome. ‘Why are you here when I made it quite clear the other night that I didn’t want to see you again?’ she demanded, trying desperately to take control of the situation.

‘You words told me one thing but your body told a different story.’ Gabriel leaned back in the armchair, very much at his ease. He was casually dressed today in jeans and a fine woolen cable knit sweater. The navy blue of the sweater suited his coloring, highlighting his dark good looks, the angular cheekbones and square chin and that white, flashing smile. She had always thought that if Gabriel had ever had to work for a living instead of running his families estates in Catalonia, he could have taken a job in modeling. She’d told him so one day, when they’d been walking along the beach, arms wrapped around each other. He had lifted a derisive lip at the suggestion. ‘Such occupations are not for men.’

‘And I suppose bullfighting is,’ she’d teased him.

He had shrugged. ‘I see no sport in killing a beast that has no choice but to defend itself.’ Those words had merely confirmed for her the knowledge that she had fallen in love with the most honorable man in all of Spain... Now, of course, she would have substituted ruthless for honorable.

‘Whatever you imagined happened the other night -’

‘I do not think,’ Gabriel interrupted her immediately, ‘I know. If I had felt indifference from you do you think that I would be sitting here now? We shared a passionate affair, you and I. I have never stopped thinking about you.’

‘You ended our relationship so that you could marry,’ Rhianna reminded him. She moistened her lips and tried to focus on all the anger and pain she had gone through when he had abandoned her. ‘You told me I would not be a ‘suitable’ mistress and you walked out of my life. I feel no passion for you any more.’

Before he could reply, Enid returned with a tray. She’d made a pot of fresh coffee and had included a selection of her homemade biscuits and cake.
It’s always the same
, Rhianna reflected grimly,
women the world over find a man like Gabriel impossible to resist and do whatever they can to please him
...

It wasn’t until Enid had left them that Gabriel spoke again, his voice harsh. ‘You say you feel no passion for me... I think we both know how easy it would be for me to prove that is not the case.’

Stalling for time, Rhianna leaned forward and poured them both coffee, noting as she did so that her hand was shaking a little. She put the coffee pot down abruptly. Half of her was listening for the sound of small footsteps, something to indicate that her son was awake; the other half of her was very much in the room. ‘I don’t think you need to prove anything.’

‘What is it?’ he demanded.

Startled, Rhianna stared at him, green eyes wide. ‘W-what?’

‘Something is troubling you. You’re as skittish as a foal.’ He was studying her, trying to work out what was wrong and her heart fluttered with panic.

Desperately her mind searched for something, some answer that would satisfy him. She could barely concentrate, waiting for Dylan to burst into the room at any moment. Inspiration came to her in a flash. ‘It’s Grady,’ she told him in a rush. ‘He’s due back soon.’

Gabriel arched an eyebrow. ‘So?’

‘So I don’t want him to find you here. He... he gets jealous when other men flirt with me.’ Rhianna apologized silently to the absent Grady, although she knew him well enough to know that he would find the idea of him being jealous amusing. ‘If he finds you here he’ll be furious.’

Gabriel appeared anything but alarmed by the prospect of Grady’s return. ‘I promise not to hit him.’

Rhianna flinched, visions of Grady and Gabriel fighting over her too appalling to contemplate. ‘Of course you can’t
hit
him.’