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CHAPTER ONE IF SHE WAS going to do this, then she had better get on with it, Alexa told herself firmly. In fact, she had better get on with it right now, she added fiercely, knowing there was no other way forward.Because the truth was that she did have to do this. Somebody had to, that was for sure. No one else was going to do it. And definitely not Natalie.Natalie would never have coped with this. She’d have given in, gone down under pressure, and she’d have ended up saying the exact opposite of what she’d come to say—what she needed to say.If Natalie had had to face Santos Cordero then she would have agreed to go through with this wedding she didn’t want, just as she’d been agreeing to do right from the start. She’d go through with it and as a result she’d miss out on her chance of a real relationship, real love. No, Natalie was better being on her way to the airport and a new life.Leaving her older half-sister to tidy up after her. It was now Alexa’s job to clean up, apologise, expl
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO ‘WHAT?’Alexa found that she was blinking in confusion, trying to make sense of Santos’s words, but most of all trying to understand or even believe in his reaction.If that laugh had been unexpected, then the rest of his words sounded almost surreal. When she had been expecting distress, anger, bitterness at the way that he had been betrayed and left at the altar by the woman he wanted to marry, instead there was dark cynicism, and an almost careless dismissal of what she had just said.‘You don’t care? But surely…?’Santos’s response was a shockingly indifferent shrug of his broad shoulders under the fine cloth of his immaculately tailored jacket, and he pushed both hands through the gleaming darkness of his hair as if relaxing after a long day.But relaxed was the last word she would use to describe the set of his face, the tight compression of his sensual mouth, the way that a taut muscle jumped in his jaw. And the glittering look he turned on her had nothing that was comfor
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE HAD SHE REALLY thought that things would get easier? Alexa asked herself a couple of hours later. The truth was that she really had no idea whether things were getting better—or so much worse.Restless and totally ill at ease, Alexa prowled around the huge blue and gold dining room in which the meal that was to have been part of the reception following Santos Cordero’s wedding had been served and where now a small army of his staff was clearing away the remains of the wonderful food.It had been delicious, at least, the one or two mouthfuls she had tried had been out of this world, but she had found it impossible to actually swallow more than a couple of bites. Her stomach had been churning so wildly, her head throbbing, and a feeling as if a hundred thousand butterflies were dancing along her veins had made it almost impossible to try and sit still.And matters had been made so much worse by the way that Santos had insisted that she sit beside him. Right next to him in the
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR ‘ME?’He couldn’t really mean that—could he?She had thought she knew exactly why Santos had determined on holding the reception in spite of the fact that there had been no marriage to celebrate. Ruthless pride had kept him holding his head high, refusing to admit that anything had gone wrong at all. The man who didn’t give a damn that he was nicknamed the brigand was also determined that no one should think he gave a damn about what had happened today.He had told her straight out that his planned marriage to Natalie had been nothing but a marriage of convenience but he would still show the world how little he cared for his bride’s defection by carrying on with the party without her. But surely it must be every bit as much of an endurance test for him as it was for her, with everyone’s eyes on them, every move he made being observed and commented on.Her disbelieving question was dismissed by another of those disarming smiles that lit his face so vividly, yet somehow managed
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE AN ENDING OR a beginning?The reception was over, everyone had left, but she still had no idea of what the answer to her question could be.Alexa hurried down the curving stone steps that led from the terrace to the swimming pool, anxious to get onto the lower level of the garden where she would be hidden from sight by the shadows and the darkness. She needed time on her own to snatch in deep, much needed breaths of air, cool her burning cheeks, and hopefully calm the racing pulse that was throbbing at her temples and making her heart thud against the walls of her chest.She needed time to think. Time to collect her thoughts and try to bring them under some sort of control.Reaching the tiled area that surrounded the pool, she settled down on one of the wooden seats and kicked off the crippling shoes, sighing deeply as her cramped toes were freed and the pressure of the straps over her feet eased. If only she could ease the confusion in her mind as easily.She was supposed to b
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX NO!The rejection of his arrogant assertion was like a scream in her head, begging to be flung right in his smug, egotistical face. She had almost opened her mouth to let it out when a far too belated streak of common sense caught up with her, making her catch it back, swallow it down. Hastily adjusting her mood and dragging up some degree of control from the depths of her mind, she forced herself to look him right in the face, managing to keep herself calm in spite of the mockery that made his eyes glitter in the moonlight, the touch of a knowing smile that curved his mouth at the corners.‘I also said that I didn’t want to be mauled…’That smile grew a little wider, taking her words and her composure with it. But there was no matching lightening of his eyes, and his voice was cold and clipped when he took up the challenge in her words.‘And you and I both know that I wasn’t mauling you. I have never mauled a woman in my life and I certainly was not doing so just now. For one
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN SO NOW YOU can take your sister’s place. It was impossible. The man was mad—he had to be.‘No way! It’s just not happening!’‘And why not, hmm?’ Santos shot back. ‘Why is that so impossible?’‘Because—because you don’t know me. I don’t know you.’‘I know that I like what I see and I believe that you do too.’‘Well, yes…’The answer was snatched from her lips before she had time to consider just how foolish she was being in admitting it. The look of dark satisfaction that crossed his face, burning in his eyes, curling the corners of his sensual mouth, made her blood run both hot and cold in exactly the same moment so that she trembled as if she was in the grip of some dangerous fever.I like what I see. Had he really said that about her? After years of living in Natalie’s shadow, of hearing her sister described as the beautiful one, the one who had men buzzing round her like bees around a honey pot, it shook her rigid that a man like Santos would actually express his feelings so
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT CINDERELLA WAS WELL and truly back from the ball.Alexa’s smile was wry as she unlocked her front door and let herself back into her cottage after a long day at work. The contrast between the luxury and style of Santos’s beautiful house outside Seville and this tiny home, with its slightly shabby décor and worn appearance, couldn’t have been much greater. But at least this was a home and not a showplace as the Seville house had been. A showplace with no heart, and no real warmth of any sort.Much like its owner.She certainly wouldn’t trade one for the other any day. Not even when her own little cottage felt as chilled and unwelcoming as it did now. The central-heating timer must be on the blink again.The weather too was as different as it could be from the mild temperatures she had left behind in Spain. Here in Yorkshire, the wind was a biting, bitter chill, and the forecast was for it to get even colder over the weekend. There were even suggestions of a storm. Certainly th
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE ‘COME FOR…’Alexa couldn’t believe what she had heard. Panic was buzzing inside her head, making her thoughts reel, so she was sure that she hadn’t actually caught what he had said. That he couldn’t have said…He just couldn’t have said ‘I’ve come for you.’Could he?But Santos stood there, big and dark and dangerous, with his scarred hand raised to unfasten the buttons of his heavy coat. And with that gleam in his eyes, the taunting one that she had come, through painful experience, to recognise as meaning trouble for someone—and in this case that someone was very definitely her.Even if he was just teasing then it was a cold-blooded, wicked teasing, one that made her nerves twist in apprehension and lifted the hairs on the back of her neck in a way that made her shiver inwardly.‘What do you mean, you’ve come for me? There’s nothing for you here. Nothing about me that you could want or can have.’‘Are you so sure of that?’ Santos shrugged himself out of his coat and tossed it a
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN DID ALEXA MONTAGUE really not know what was going on, or was she playing some more complicated, carefully planned game along with the rest of her family?The question nagged at Santos’s thoughts as he drove away from the cottage, distracting him dangerously from the control of his car. He really needed all his concentration in the appalling weather conditions.But in spite of the fact that he knew he should think of driving and nothing else it was impossible to stop his thoughts drifting back over the time he had spent in the cottage, and the images of Alexa as she had been then.He wanted to recall the things she had said, how she had spoken them, and most importantly how she had looked as she’d reacted to him or answered his questions. He needed to be able to interpret her facial expressions, her body language, to try to understand just what was going on here, but the problem was that the memories he needed were not the ones he could recall most easily.Instead, the images th
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN THE LIGHT OF the dawn breaking beyond the uncurtained window was what slowly dragged Alexa back to wakefulness from the depths of the deep, exhausted sleep she had fallen into at some late point in the night. Her eyes opened slowly, blinked dreamily, staring up at the white-painted ceiling above her as she struggled to recognise where she was.In her home, in her bedroom—of course that was where she was. Every instinct told her she was in the all too familiar surroundings, every part of her recognised the wallpaper, the feel of the bed, the plain white bed linen…but at the same time everything seemed and felt so very different that it was as if she had awakened somewhere totally new and strange. Somewhere that she didn’t recognise at all.But then she blinked again, stretching slightly, and her right arm and leg came into contact with the hard warmth of a strong body lying relaxed and totally at ease just beside her. A long, muscled, relaxed male body, she acknowledged and
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE ALEXA HAD NO idea how long her father had been talking before he finally ground to a halt. She only knew that when he did she barely had enough strength or mental ability to say anything in reply. She could only manage something vague and unformed, something along the lines of yes, she understood. Yes, she saw that he had had no possible alternative, not one that would solve the situation, keep her stepmother from a total breakdown and himself out of gaol.Out of gaol. There it was. There was the very worst-case scenario summed up right there. She had always known that her father could be totally selfish, the wife he was devoted to even worse—but this!Because of his own stupid actions—his stupid, illegal actions—Stanley Montague had risked not only his home and his income but also his own freedom. If Santos had prosecuted him then he would be in prison right now.But the prosecution was still only a threat as long as Santos Cordero got what he wanted. And what he wanted wa
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN ‘DON’T TELL ME that you didn’t enjoy last night,’ Santos said now, his voice rough and raw, his searing gaze burning into her. ‘Don’t tell me that it wasn’t what you wanted—what you still want. Let me—’No, Alexa wanted to cry, seeing what was in his eyes, knowing what he intended and wanting desperately to avoid it. But the word was never spoken aloud, pushed back into her throat by the rapid descent of his mouth, the fierce pressure that forced her lips open under his, crushing them in the force of his passion.And for a moment she yielded. For the space of several frantic heartbeats she could do nothing else. She wanted his kiss, wanted it desperately and although it tore at her wounded heart she couldn’t hold back her response, couldn’t stop herself from putting all her love and her hunger into kissing him back. Feeling it, Santos caught her up in his arms, crushing her closer, taking her mouth with the force of the primitive male passion that had him totally in its
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
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