LILLIE HAD NEVER been to Portugal before.
But then, Lillie had never really been anywhere before, not really, aside from London that one time. She’d otherwise remained in Scotland for the most part, with only the occasional trip down to Whitby with her parents to spend a few cold summer beach days in that holiday caravan park they liked so well.
Her trip to Spain had been the start of a glorious new international jet-set kind of a life. That was what she’d told herself all the way home, still sunburnt and buzzing and half-wild from her night with Tiago. Spain was the beginning, she’d told herself as the plane landed in drizzly, bleak Aberdeen. The future was going to feel just as magic as that long, lush night had done.
She’d meant it. She really had. But thus far her glorious jet-setting had been confined to daydreams and bright, happy travel documentaries. Then she’d discovered she was pregnant and such things seemed even more out of reach than they’d been before. Because all it took was one positive pregnancy test to start thinking a lot more seriously about the reality of...well, everything. Such as the things she’d put off thinking about for ages, like why she was still living in a house better suited to new university graduates. Or what she really and truly wanted to do with her life, which she was pretty sure wasn’t making PowerPoint presentations.
The trouble was, all of that felt like a fight and Lillie had never been much for fighting. That seemed part and parcel of the sort of passion her parents enjoyed, but had missed her little life entirely.
Sometimes she even told herself that a small, comfortable life was a virtue.
But nothing about this day was small or comfortable.
And Lillie was not at all prepared to be swept out of Tiago’s car on a rainy, blustery tarmac somewhere outside of London, then ushered up the steps to the private jet that waited there like it was the most ordinary thing in the world when it certainly was no such thing.
It was all she could do not to gape about her like the overset, overawed country lass she most assuredly was.
And it had not been a long flight, but it had certainly been eye-opening.
Just like his office, the plane was a pageant of gleaming marble mixed in with the liberal application of rich, dark woods and lashings of plush, inviting leather besides. There were couches littered about the place like it was a high-class lounge in the sort of desperately posh and unaffordable flats Lillie only looked at in magazines. And in case anyone was feeling peckish there was a full cream tea service with plate after plate of clever little sandwiches cut just so, airy crumpets with pots of butter and jam, and scones drowning in clotted cream that tasted of dreams come true.
Lillie had three, just to be certain.
It was all a far cry indeed from the tiny packet of overly dry pretzels she’d had to pay for on her desperately uncomfortable flights to and from Spain and down from Aberdeen this morning. Bargain airfare, after all, was about efficiency, not comfort.
Tiago’s jet was nicer than any home Lillie had lived in.
It was nicer than any home she’d ever been in, for that matter.
Tiago had left her to her tea, retreating to what one of the stewards called “the office suite,” to be distinguished from “the staterooms,” to handle some of his business. Leaving Lillie to scoff scones and tea and darling little petits fours and reflect upon the fact that she hadn’t objected when he’d suggested she not go back to Aberdeen at all.
“Not when there is so much to sort out between the two of us,” he had said in that way of his that made everything inside her feel light and shivery. Especially when he had looked at her bump, in a way she wanted to call almost...possessive. It had made her heart flip inside her chest. “Excuse me, I mean the three of us.”
The man was a menace.
But apparently she didn’t think he was too much of a menace, because there she was. Lounging about on an achingly lovely leather couch on a plane she reckoned was nicer than some of those old medieval castles with all the dungeons and drafts. Having a bit of a high tea all on her own while she was being flown off to sunny Portugal at a moment’s notice, thank you very much.
She had texted Patricia, though she knew that was unlikely to make her boss happy.
It looks like this might take longer than expected. Not sure when I’ll be back, to be honest.
The reply had been surprising.
You take as long as you need. And don’t be afraid to hold his feet to the fire, either. Bloody men.
Lillie had wanted to send back something suitably rousing and woman powery in solidarity, but the truth of it was that no fires held to feet seemed to be necessary. She wasn’t sure what to make of it. Her stomach had been in knots all the way to his office, certain that he would be horrible to her. Or that his battalions of staff would bar her from even laying eyes on him.
She’d expected a fight, was the thing, and this didn’t seem like anything of the kind.
Though, somehow, she couldn’t quite let herself be lulled into any sort of sense of security. Not quite yet.
They landed in Portugal some while later, the sea in the distance as they flew in over rolling vineyards and stretches of green that looked like golf courses. Lillie felt she ought to ask questions about where they were going, but she was much too sated and drowsy from the lovely tea she’d consumed. Added to the fact that her pregnancy made her a whole lot sleepier than she’d ever been before.
Still, she followed Tiago out into a glorious bit of sunshine happily enough, pleased and yet, now, unsurprised to see yet another vehicle waiting for them. No scrabbling about looking for Tube stations or taxis for Tiago Villela. The SUV that waited near the airfield looked suitably rugged, given that they were out in a bit of countryside, and she wondered if they might be in for a spot of off-roading. Maybe there was something wrong with her that she found that exciting when, by rights, she should have been a bit more put off by this man who’d swept her off to a foreign country without blinking an eye.
Wasn’t he lucky that she carried her passport as a matter of course when she got on a plane, on the off chance she might be seized with the urge—and blessed with the funds—to fly to the Maldives.
Lillie assured herself now that she was well ready to get stern with him if necessary, should any of this suddenly seem less glamorous and more, well, anything else—
But instead she found herself gazing out the window beside her, the lovely, bright afternoon sunshine making her want to sigh with the pleasure of it. It was so dark and cold in Scotland this time of year. This past weekend had been the annual Christmas lights switch-on parade in Aberdeen. Lillie loved the holiday season. She loved the parade with Santas on scooters and all the choirs singing and the lights coming on, bright as you like, to make at least a small dent in the thick fall darkness.
Yet the lights over Union Street had nothing on the Portuguese sun.
Tiago sat beside her in the back of the SUV, looking up now and again from the mobile where he was typing rapidly—just in case she’d forgotten for even a moment that he was a very important and busy man. Not the pool boy at all. And so, not to be outdone, she pulled out her own mobile and fired off a few texts of her own—mostly to her housemates, reminding them that there were garbage bins to take out and rent money to start getting together for the first of December, and it felt better than she’d ever thought it would to remind them that she would not be taking responsibility for such things moving forward.
Might be a good idea to elect one of your lot to take over these duties, or see to that cleaning rota chart I suggested last summer.
She attached a smiley face, because that was how they liked to communicate unpleasant things to her, like the fact they wanted her out by Hogmanay so the new, age-appropriate housemate could move in by the time the new year had been adequately celebrated on the second of January.
And then she felt better still when the responses started coming in, most seeming deeply shocked that they could hold meetings to make her move out and then expect her to carry on playing the part of house mum all the same.
When she stuck her phone back in the pocket of her coat, she found Tiago studying her from across the car’s back seat that had, until that moment, seemed spacious indeed.
Now it felt...close. And much hotter than it should have been, with the cold air from the vents blowing on her suddenly too-warm face.
“You look pleased with yourself,” he observed, as if he’d been studying her, a notion that did not make her feel any cooler.
“Have you lived with a great many housemates? In shared accommodation?” They were following a long, narrow drive between high walls. There were olive trees hanging overhead, moss and vines creeping this way and that, and the walls’ ancient granite caught the sun. It looked magical. It looked as if they might drive straight on into Narnia, and if they did, Lillie would not have been at all surprised. “I’m guessing not.”
“When I was at university I lived in a house with some friends,” he said after a moment, as if he would have preferred not to share that. As if it was a deeply personal bit of information to tell her that he had once shared a home with anyone. Or maybe the personal part was that he’d once had friends and, presumably, still did. Like a regular man instead of a world-famous billionaire who had private jets and the like. “I much preferred that to living in halls.”
“Then you know they can take a bit of managing.” She smiled, because dispensing with a role she’d outgrown long since felt so good that she was forced to wonder why on earth she’d taken this long to do it. Maybe this unexpected trip to the closest thing she’d ever seen to Narnia was, at last, the proper start to the new life she’d promised herself five months back. Maybe this was her chance to step straight in instead of waffling about it and carrying on the same as ever. Because one way or another, everything was changing. What if this was her chance to choose a few of those changes? Lillie made her smile a bit wider. “I’ve resigned as manager, effective immediately. And while they were happy enough to rid themselves of the pregnant woman making things awkward in the house, by existing apparently, they really didn’t think through the fact that now someone else will have to step in and see to the managing. Is it wrong that I’m enjoying it?”
It wasn’t that she’d forgotten his eyes, because she hadn’t forgotten a single thing about him. She doubted she could or ever would. The trouble with them was that they were not quite blue, not quite green. And that looking at them felt like falling from a great height, or possibly flying, and somehow bracing for it didn’t make it any better.
But she would be lying if she tried to tell herself she didn’t like that soaring sensation.
He gazed at her for a long moment, as if shocked she’d asked him to weigh in on her prosaic concerns. She wasn’t sure why she had, but she didn’t take it back. “I do not think it is ever wrong to allow others to marinate in the consequences of their actions,” he told her, as if measuring each word. Then he inclined his head. “Nor to enjoy it when they do, if only privately.”
“Thank you.” Lillie smiled wider, that soaring feeling getting even more intense when she did. “That’s vindicating.”
The steep walls gave way, opening up over views of tidy vineyards and whitewashed buildings with red-tiled roofs. At first she thought they’d come to some kind of village. Then she realized that no, all the buildings had the same crest on their walls. The crest she’d seen behind Tiago in the news program, and all over his offices. This must all be his.
She felt something inside her shift, hard, as she stared out at the sun and the vineyards and the trees in the distance. How far did it go, this land of his? Was it possible he truly owned...everything?
Lillie couldn’t quite get her head around it.
They were back to the narrow lane with high walls again, rounding a tight curve that had her closing her eyes for fear they’d crash head-on into oncoming traffic—but when there was no screeching of brakes or the like, she opened up her eyes again.
The SUV shot out of the shadows into another dazzling bit of light, and that was when the house came into view.
Once again, she had no idea how she managed to keep her jaw from dropping.
Because it wasn’t a proper house at all. It wasn’t a tidy semidetached in a quiet village like the one she’d grown up in. It wasn’t Catriona’s flat on the top floor of a converted row of terraces. It wasn’t even one of those tarted-up houses out in Bielside, where all the flash oil and gas men lived and various royal personages were said to have once visited.
The place went on and on, terraces and balconies, pools and gardens, all arranged around a magnificent multileveled home that commanded the hillside it stood upon and looked out at the surrounding area like a conquering hero. It was like a private palace, and Tiago wasn’t even looking at it. He wasn’t sat there, poised for her reaction—that was how commonplace it all was to him, she realized.
This was when it began to really hit home how wealthy the man really was.
“How did you find this place?” she asked, because it was that or succumb to the wild buzzing in her ears. And because it sounded like the right sort of thing to ask.
Appropriately neutral, she thought.
He looked at her, too much blue and green. “Portugal?”
Lillie could hear from that carefully blank undercurrent in his voice that it was a stupid question after all. But all she did was gaze back at him, as if daring him to say so.
And she thought she saw the hint of a smile move over his face, after a moment or two, when there’d been very little of that since she’d tracked him down. But it was only a flash, so quick she wasn’t sure that it was real. It was far more likely that she wanted to see him smile and that she’d made it up because it made her feel better to think he might.
That he might be as captivated with her now as he’d been that night.
Don’t be foolish, she lectured herself. This is about the baby, not you.
And if she was a decent person and had the faintest hope of being a good mother, she wouldn’t need it to be about anything more than that, would she?
“My mother’s family are Portuguese,” he was saying, once again in that careful, deliberate way of his. As if words were a precious resource and he intended to cultivate each and every one of them. “This land has been in her family some generations. The Villelas, as perhaps you know, maintain our ancestral presence in Spain.”
“Fascinating,” Lillie said, wrinkling up her nose. “The Mertons have maintained our ancestral presence in Scotland as well, though the thatched huts of us peasants don’t stand up to the test of time nearly as well as ye olde family pile.”
And once again, he looked startled. As if she’d surprised him.
But not, she thought after a moment, in a bad way. Necessarily.
Because once again, she thought she saw the hint of a smile on that marvelously rock-hard jaw of his. And it was clear to her that she was becoming a little too enamored of that. By this notion that she could actually burrow down beneath his skin in some way. Disrupt him, even.
Hadn’t that been what had happened that night? She wouldn’t have put it into those words. She hadn’t. But that was what he had said himself in that hotel room in Spain. Again and again. What have you done to me? What sort of sorceress are you?
She’d thought it no more than a bit of flowery language—or anyway, she’d told herself it was, in retrospect. While ordering herself to forget about him.
But now she had to wonder if this man really went about living out his life with no one to tease him a bit. She thought that was sad. Lillie was fully aware that she’d let her own life get a bit sad, these last few years. It was just that she hadn’t felt that overarching need to change things the way all her friends had, one after the next. She hadn’t felt pulled to anything the way they had.
That was what happened when a person was raised in the shadow of a great love story. It made all else pale in comparison. Lillie had been conditioned to seek out her passions—but she hadn’t exactly tripped over loads of passions lying about in the course of her life, had she?
While they’d all lived in the house, everything had been a grand old laugh, and that had seemed quite grand enough, for a time. Even now, though the lot of them were rarely able to get together as a group any longer, any time she visited one or the other of them it was always the same. The old jokes, the endless laughter, the sheer delight in poking at each other. It was one of the things that made life worth living, as far she could tell, whether there were passions aplenty or not.
Yet unless she was mistaken, it was all new to Tiago.
Because apparently the personal palace and endless vineyards and private jets weren’t quite the laugh they seemed from afar.
“You came with no luggage,” he said as the car pulled up to a stop in front of the grand entry. Or perhaps it was the servants’ back entrance. How was Lillie meant to know the difference on such a grand scale? “I’ve taken the liberty of instructing my staff to provide you with a wardrobe during your stay. I hope that is not too impertinent.”
“How do you know what size I wear?” she asked without thinking.
His blue-green gaze changed, then. It went dark like a sudden storm and her breath stopped.
She knew she shouldn’t have asked that. Because Lillie knew exactly how he knew her proportions. She knew that he had taken her measure, inch by glorious inch. That it was likely he was the only person alive who knew her body better than she did.
Of course, now she also knew that he remembered that night in at least as much detail as she did.
“When in doubt,” he said quietly into the thunder that rumbled—waiting just out of reach—between them, “I told them to err on the side of accommodating the changes your body has gone through since last I saw you.”
That was such an innocuous sort of thing to say, wasn’t it? There was no reason at all that her throat should go dry. That she could feel her breasts press insistently against the fabric of her dress. There was no reason at all that it should all feel like a sensual assault, leaving her breathless and doing her level best to ignore the slickness and heat between her legs.
Worse, she felt certain he knew exactly what she was trying to ignore.
Down to the slightest, faintest sensation. He knew.
For a moment, she thought that the storm hovering right there would blow her away. That they would be caught up, once more. That all of that lightning and longing would crash over them and light them up the way it had in Spain—
But instead, his gaze shuttered. He looked away.
And in the next moment, the doors of the car were opening and she had no choice but to get out after him and try her best to hide her reaction.
Out there in all that bright, revealing sunshine.
“This is my family’s long-term housekeeper, Leonor,” Tiago announced with some formality there by the side of the SUV. He beckoned an older woman closer and Lillie realized with a start that she hadn’t paid the slightest bit of attention to anything but him. She hadn’t even noticed the staff who waited for them, arranged in lines before a set of great doors that were flung wide open, presumably to receive the master of the house.
She ordered herself to get her body back under control before she made a complete fool of herself, because surely all this sunshine meant that everyone staring at her could see her reaction to this man. Surely they could feel that same storm approaching, the same as she could, and could track it on her.
But it was hard to keep her mind on such horrors, because she was hot. The sun was glaring down, her body was still reacting to the way he’d looked at her inside the car, and it was all too much. She found herself shrugging out of her favorite big coat that doubled as a cozy blanket in a pinch, only stopping when she heard a murmur of reaction from the waiting staff.
Tiago looked at them, then looked at her and the obvious bump that was her belly, and was that...dismay she saw move through his gaze? Pride in all that distracting blue and green?
But she couldn’t tell, for it, too, was gone too quickly.
“I leave you in Leonor’s capable hands,” Tiago said, when there were so many other things he could have said. So many other things she wished he would have said. Then he did something with his head that put Lillie in mind of a bow.
It was quick, and then he turned and marched toward the grand doors, all of his staff trailing behind him after a few rapid commands in what she assumed was Portuguese.
What she noticed most of all was that he didn’t look back.
“If you will come with me, madam,” Leonor said, though Lillie was not fooled by her overtly polite tone. Not when she could see the glint of steel in the old woman’s eyes.
Lillie aimed a big smile her way, and tried her best to look sheepish, or docile. Or whatever it was that would be expected of her, since Tiago hadn’t seen fit to offer her any instructions.
The old woman’s brows arched up, but she said nothing. She only did a version of that head-only bow herself, then led the way into the waiting house.
Unsurprisingly, it was a dazzling affair. Airy, open rooms that let the sunlight in on every side. White walls, exposed beams, tiles and mosaics everywhere. There was even a wide, center courtyard that was its own lush garden.
“This is beautiful,” Lillie breathed, staring at the flower—flowers!—that were blooming right there before her this close to December.
“Senhor Villela’s grandmother loved nothing more than her plants,” the housekeeper told her, with what sounded like pride. “In her later years, she became obsessed with orchids and grew them here in our mild climate. She could often be found here, chatting with the bees and the birds, and singing to her flowers. We like to think that sometimes, she can still be felt here. Or heard singing on the breeze.”
“What a lovely notion,” Lillie said quietly, drinking in the bright colors and so much green.
And she wasn’t sure she understood the assessing way the other woman looked at her then, so she pretended not to see it.
Instead she followed Leonor through the rest of the sprawling house, crossing through the courtyard and then heading out into the wing that waited on the far side. Lillie didn’t know where to look. At the stunning furnishings, clearly placed just so, that very clearly utilized interior design elements that she’d only ever read about in magazines. Every room had its own specific character, she thought, yet was clearly a part of the whole—and each one was inviting. There were windows everywhere and skylights, too. The walls were filled with art, and though she couldn’t identify any of the paintings, it seemed clear that each and every one of them had been chosen as much for the mastery of the artist as a particular enjoyment of what had been painted.
“Your rooms will have everything you need, I’m sure,” Leonor said with a certain serene confidence as they walked down yet another hallway. “You are welcome to enjoy the rest of the guest wing as well. It has its own small library and a media room, should the private one in your rooms prove insufficient. Down at that end—” she nodded off toward what looked like nothing but a great wash of light down the length of the hall “—there is a patio that leads to a small pool that you may use exclusively while you are here. There is also a well-equipped gym, if that is your preference. If you wish to ride, you need only ring the stables to let them know you’re coming, so that they might be prepared for you. And, naturally, you are welcome to walk wherever you please on the property.”
Lillie could hardly take all that in. So she simply nodded, as if she spent every day of her life being offered such luxuries so offhandedly and stopped when the older woman did, just outside the first room along the hall.
Leonor flung open the doors and strode inside, leaving Lillie to trail after her. She saw quickly that she hadn’t misheard. The housekeeper had said rooms, plural. There was a vast yet comfortable lounge with enough seating to fit an army, then what looked like a bit of an office space, complete with a computer and some other corporate-looking appliances. Another sort of sitting room a bit farther along opened up into a whole walk-in closet complex comprising three separate rooms, a sprawling en suite bathroom with a separate area for a bath with a view, and then, at the very end, the bedroom.
Which was, not to put too fine a point on it, much bigger than the entire ground floor of her house in Aberdeen, complete with the shared lounge and kitchen.
The room had a fireplace on one end, its own sitting area, and the most over-the-top four-poster bed she’d ever seen.
“I hope this will suffice,” Leonor intoned.
“Yes,” Lillie said, somehow managing not to laugh out loud at the notion there might be anyone alive who would find this insufficient. She tried to look posh. “It should do.”
And when the other woman left her there, saying something about leaving her to settle in, Lillie finally broke. She burst into a helpless sort of laughter. She laughed and laughed, clinging to the nearest post at the foot of the bed until she felt weak and tears were streaming down her face. Then, gingerly—a bit as if she expected armed guards to burst in and carry her away—she crawled up onto the bed, and began laughing all over again. Because the mattress was soft as a feather and she had never felt anything like it. It was tempting to believe they slept on actual clouds here.
It was so soft, and so clearly elegant, and smelled ever so faintly like lavender and far fancier herbs besides, that Lillie doubted very much that she’d be able to actually drift off to sleep surrounded by such class—
And so was surprised to find herself blinking awake some time later.
The position of the light and shadows in the room suggested she’d slept a good while. She pushed herself up onto her elbows, frowning and cranky, the way she always was after a nap. Her cheeks felt flushed too hot and she had to shove her damp curls back out of her face, quite certain that she’d slept hard the way she always did. As if felled by a huntsman’s ax.
She heard faint sounds from somewhere outside this room and everything inside her leaped a bit, with his name inside her like its own dancing bit of flame.
Tiago.
And as she swung her feet off the side of the bed, not at all surprised to find she’d slept with her boots still on, the rest of the day came flooding back to her. Tiago himself. Seeing him again in his office in London. That ridiculously fancy plane. This house that was its own city, it was so large.
The way everything had sparked between them again in the car—though Lillie wasn’t sure how she felt about that. She was happy that she hadn’t made the whole thing up, the way she’d tried so hard to convince herself she had all these months. Or if it actually only hurt more, because now she knew it was real.
But she also knew that it was real. Without question.
And she also knew where he was.
Though as she got to her feet, rubbing her palms over her face and heading toward that soft noise she’d heard, she had to question that, too. Did she know where he was? This was a very large house in what appeared to be its very own countryside, for one thing. Not to mention, he also had his own plane. He could be anywhere.
But she found she couldn’t follow that up the way she wanted to, because when she emerged into that sitting room she’d seen when she first walked into her rooms, Leonor was standing there overseeing the staff as they laid out a meal for her.
And it turned out that she was ravenously hungry.
“I hope you enjoy what the cook has prepared,” the housekeeper said, standing to the side of the table near the window, looking...assessing, yet again. “Some local delicacies have been prepared alongside what we consider more typical fare for you.”
“A bit of haggis, then?” Lillie asked with a laugh and then regretted it, because the other woman only gazed back at her.
“Please make yourself at home in this wing,” she said in that excessively calm manner of hers. “Relax however you see fit, refresh yourself after your journey, and I will come to you in the morning.”
It was not until after Lillie had polished off enough food to feed a football team or two that she realized that Leonor had obliquely suggested that she stay put. That she confine herself to this wing, in fact.
But Lillie...had not agreed to that, had she?
She went and availed herself of that glorious bathroom, rinsing off the travel and the nap and her feast. Unable to help herself, she went and peeked into the wardrobe, and found that Tiago—or his staff, it was almost certainly his staff—really had thought of everything. And more, that every single item of clothing that hung in all three rooms of that walk-in closet complex was exactly the sort of thing that Lillie would have chosen for herself.
If, that was, she had ever had unlimited funds at her disposal.
And though she had considered herself practical and frugal the whole of her life, it turned out that all it took was two good meals and a well-stocked closet and Lillie was nothing but a silly little madam after all, more than happy to play dress-up.
But when she finished with that, and was wearing the kind of outfit that once would have made her laugh because it was so out of her usual reach, she set off out of her rooms. Plural. She looked down the hall toward the bit that led to all the parts of the great, big house that weren’t a part of the guest wing, and decided that what she really wanted to do on her first night in Portugal was a spot of exploring.
“It has nothing to do with Tiago,” she told herself virtuously. And loud enough to bounce back at her from the quiet, likely reproachful walls. “I just want to get a sense of the place.”
And she kept right on lying to herself as she set off, absolutely not looking for him at all.