Billionaire: Billionaire Romance: Billionaire Tiger (A Billionaire New Adult Shifter Contemporary Romance) (81 page)

“Okay Charlotte, you can let go of this. It’s been three years.” I turned to the ocean and asked it take the pain away. I grabbed the letter and read it one last time, even though it was already branded into my mind. I wanted to give myself one last experience of reading it. The way I read it the morning of my wedding day. It read,

“Charlotte, I’m sorry. I can’t do this. I thought I could, but something just feels wrong. We are good together. Not good enough though. We’ve lost the sparks and I think you know it too. We are so comfortable with each other that it no longer feels the way it once did. I don’t want a lifetime of that, and you
don’t deserve a lifetime of mediocrity. I will always love you and I hope one day you will see that us not getting married today as a good thing. Sorry, Robert”

That’s it. With those words he had ruined my life. Not just for that moment, but for three years. He had moved on, or so I heard, half a year later. That fact made me realize he truly didn’t love me. Yet, I still loved him. That last thought made me so angry. I grabbed the letter and I tore it to pieces. I tore it until it couldn’t be torn anymore. Tinier and tinier the pieces got with my escalating anger. Then I leaned over and placed the pieces in the water. It went out with the rush of the small creek. There it was done. I was symbolically letting go. Enough is enough. I was a smart person, and being a a woman destined to be a spinster, I saw the world as it was. I didn’t sugar coat it. I didn’t expect fairy tale endings. I knew there was real happiness and the illusion of it. I thought I had the real thing, but I had the illusion. That I couldn’t tell the difference between the two shook me to the core. If I didn’t know then, what makes me think I would know next time, if there ever were a next time. The way I had been living, shut off to everything except my family, I feared I didn’t know how to be with a man, yet alone be in love. Tears poured down my face at these last thoughts. The self-pity made me very angry. I turned toward the trail stomped back to my family’s estate. Kicking up dirt with each step.

I was so lost in my thoughts I didn’t realize that I was not alone. I fumbled with my purse and in my haste I dropped it. Actually I hurled it across the trail. A hand reached out and picked it up and handed it to me. I looked up, and into the striking face of a gentleman. He was not a local, he was a gorgeous and exotic Spaniard, a Latin man.

He had long dark hair that swept to the side and over his eyes. He looked up at me from his kneeling position with large green eyes. The lining around his eyes was a darkish hue, almost like he was wearing eyeliner. That look that made his eyes really stand out. He had an outdoorsy look and feel to him, like a pirate. I swallowed hard.

“Here you are Senora,” he said with a thick accent.

“Gracias,” I said in my poor Spanish that only came out as a whisper. I already had tears streaming down my face and I had to fight back the opening of the floodgates. I could burst into a tear storm at any second. I grabbed my purse and ran away. Behind me, the gorgeous Latin man called out to me.

“Senora, can I help?”

I kept running and didn’t look back. It was not right for a woman to be alone with out a chaperone in the woods with a stranger. It could further damage my reputation. I picked up the skirt of my long empire waist lavender dress. I opened my door and slammed it behind me. I didn’t even notice if the man had followed me. I took a look at myself in the mirror; my dark brown eyes were bloodshot from crying. I was suddenly embarrassed that I had let that sexy man see me like this. The circles under my eyes were dark. I needed rest. Long hours of sleep. I brushed my hair out. It was very long, all the way down to my waist. It was a chestnut brown color, but got lighter the more time I spent in the sun. I tied it into a thick braid before I spread out on the bed determined to sleep for ten hours. I wanted to wake up to a brand new day. It would be a future with out being haunted by that letter.

I fell asleep. Into a deep sleep full of strange dreams where I was running from something that I could never see. The next morning I woke up early. I felt refreshed and almost like a real person again. I was determined to not cry anymore. I had got it all out of me like a toxin. It was sunrise when I woke up. I opened the terrace windows and watched as the sun sat on top of the horizon. I breathed in the fresh air. I loved the way the grass smelled after the rains. It was as if you were truly breathing in the energy of your surroundings. My stomach grumbled and I realized I hadn’t eaten since I lunch yesterday. I was too upset to eat then. Now I was famished. I needed tea and a large breakfast. I got dressed and went down to breakfast with my father and mother.

It was a quiet breakfast and they didn’t even bother to ask why I had missed dinner. We ate ham and a boiled egg with tea and milk.

Later that day I decided to go on a walk around our property. It was a very small amount of land, but it did have beautiful woods on it.

“You look better,” a voice from behind me said.

I turned to see the man that picked up my purse the day before. It was the sexy Latin man that stopped my heart with one look from those green eyes. I turned to him. My eyes were wide. I didn’t know what to say. Wasn’t it custom to not bring something up like that, especially for a gentleman.

He smiled and his whole face lit up. He stared at me for a second and said,

“Senora, your key for you,” he handed a key to me.

I gasped as I realized it was the key to my journal. It must have flown out of my purse yesterday when I dropped it.

“Oh thank you,” I was confused. Was this normal? I welcomed it. It was nice to be talked to by an attractive man. It had been so long since I had even been to a party or a ball, I forgot what it felt like to be in the company of an attractive man. But after last yesterday’s run in, it felt really strange.

“There you are Senora. I do anything else for you?” he asked.

Oh, the possibilities, I thought. “No, Thank you. I must go.”

He gave sort of a bow, which seemed unusual and not at all the English way, but he wasn’t English. His gaze went from my feet all the way up to my face. It was such an obvious sexual advance I felt the need to slap him. Instead I waited until he was done looking and moved his eyes to lock with mine. I breathed in deep. I thought at any second he’s going to come to me and kiss me. He’s going to take me. That’s how obvious the energy exchange was between us. There was something happening here. He stood up right and said,

“Bien, I leave you.”

Then he stepped vanished. I turned and walked the other way. What the heck was that? What just happened? I had never had a man do that to me. How did he do that? This must be what the whole Latin lover thing is all about that I had read about in books.

I was intrigued. I continued my morning walk and then went back to my house.

“Charlotte? Is that you?” my mother’s voice echoed down the hall.

“Yes mother.”

“Come in. An invitation came today. You must see it.”

An invitation? That was odd. I went into the sitting room where my mother sat holding an elegant paper. I took it from her hands. It was an invitation to a ball. It was to be held at a grand estate by a Spaniard, the Vizconde de Seville, or the Viscount of Seville as it was in English.

I sat down with my mouth agape. I couldn’t believe it. It had to be the man in the forest.

“I know you no longer want to go to balls after the whole thing with Robert dear, but it’s been three years. You should have some fun,” my mother said. I knew that was her way of convincing me because she too wanted to go. No doubt it would be a very much talked about ball because we didn’t get Spaniards around here. She would not want to miss out on it.

“I’ll go,” I said abruptly.

“She was startled by my response. I think she was ready to spend a great deal of time convincing me.”

“Yes? Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

Then I left the room. The ball was in two weeks. I was actually excited about it.

I walked to my room fondling the thick paper of the invitation. Then something fell out of it. It was a smaller note. I was completely in shock at what was inside. It was a folded note and inside it was a pressed flower. The letter read,

“Senora, I want you to come to my estate tomorrow for lunch at noon.”

CHAPTER TWO

Dangerous

That was it! That’s the only thing the letter said. I plopped down on the bed. It was the mysterious Spaniard. I couldn’t do that. I would not go do something so out of character and so dangerous. It was not like me at all. There was no way. It was too dangerous. Not just dangerous physically, but dangerous for my reputation. I couldn’t take that risk. This man already made me feel something with one look and a few words. I couldn’t image what spending time alone with him would do to me.

I crumpled the letter ready to throw it in the wastebasket. Then I stopped. It reminded me of the day before when I had another letter in my hand. That one letter that had destroyed my life. The writer in me thought, how romantic would it be if this man turned out to be more. It was uncanny that yesterday I held a letter that broke me into pieces, and now I held a letter with so much promise and intrigue. Was this a sign? I uncurled the letter and placed it on the bed. I would force myself to think this through. My life since that fateful wedding day had not been a real life at all. I was bored to death with what I had been doing. It was a routine of work and sleep, and I was ashamed that I had wasted three years doing nothing. This was an opportunity to explore. To have a new experience out of my ordinary routine, and to have a life less ordinary, and if anything else it would make a great story.

I paced the room for the next few hours. Talking myself into and out of going. What was the harm? He would open the door, I would see him and turn and walk away if I was appalled. As rude as that might seem, it was an option. I owed this stranger nothing. I made a pros and cons list, as I often did, but that didn’t help either.

When noon came around the next day, I found myself walking in the woods to his estate. It was close by, which was why I ran into him in the woods so often. I told my mother and father that I was out walking as I always did. They never paid attention to me anymore. I had already had my reputation ruined by being jilted at the altar. What more could happen to me?

My curious nature had gotten the best of me. I needed to answer it, or it would forever bother me. This mysterious Latin man was a question that needed to be answered. An enigma. I was halfway there when I stopped and turned around. I only got a few steps and then changed my mind again and turned around going toward his estate. I knocked on the door. I was not expecting what happened next.

The door opened and the gorgeous exotic man stood there. His dark hair spilled down to just above his shoulders. He had a five o’clock shadow of a beard. He was tall dark and exotic. His skin was a beautiful tanned color that made his green eyes stand out even more. I was shocked that he was answering the door himself and not a servant. He looked at me and smiled.

“Hola Senora, I am glad you came. Come in.” He stepped back away from the door and continued, “My name is Emilio. Will you come in?”

I could scarcely speak. “I’m Charlotte,” I said in barely a whisper. I was excited and scared at the same time.

“Charlotte, it is beautiful name,” he said as he maneuvered to let me in.

“Thank you.”

“Let’s eat. Yes? I looked in the direction he pointed and there down the hallway was a massive dining room. There was a large table that sat almost fifty people. There was a candlelit lunch waiting for us. This was not what I was expecting. This was so polite. I was expecting to be aggressively ravaged when I came in the door. I didn’t expect conversation; I just expected sensual talk to lure me into bed. This was sort of refreshing, and was the first step in me realizing that I don’t know it all.

“Please sit,” he said.

“I hope you like wine,” he said as a servant poured a red liquid from a beautiful blue bottle.

“I don’t really drink it usually,” I said.

“Salud,” he said ignoring what I said. He bumped his glass against mine and took a sip from it. I did the same and swallowed hard at the strong taste and potency.

I looked at the assortment on the table. There was fresh fish, rock crab, small lobsters, oysters, and all sorts of fruits and vegetables that I had never seen before. I was amazed by the elegance of it all.

We ate slowly. The food was more of the background to drinking, talking, and flirting. I could barely concentrate as he looked at me. This man was making me feel lustful. The way he looked at me and admired my body. It felt good. It felt different. It’d been so long since I let a man admire me. It felt otherworldly.

When he spoke, he spoke with such passion. He told me how his life in Spain had been. He was from a small village further in the country, and had moved here five years earlier. He loved the beauty of Spain and was grateful it was his home. I was in complete awe of everything he was saying, but not because of the subject matter but because of the passion he had for this place. It was contagious. He knew how to fish in the ocean, he knew how to live off the land. He spent most of his time painting and helping other’s with their business projects. He was a true adventurer. He was everything I imagined him to be when I first set eyes on him.

It was the real deal as far as what I thought a Latin lover would be. After lunch we sat and talked.

He looked at me and said, “I would like to take you to look at the grounds. If you want to see it?” he said.

I narrowed my eyes at him.

“What? What is that look for?” he questioned.

“You really want to be alone with me? You don’t even know me,” I said taking a sip of the strong wine. I wanted to drown out my paranoid thoughts.

“I do know you. You are sad about something. I want to help. I want to show you fun.”

My mouth dropped open, I had almost forgot about our first run in. Of course, I was a wreck that day. I was in tears and in a deep cave of self-pity. He had picked up my key and I ran off crying like a child. I suddenly flushed and felt embarrassed by it all. It felt as if him knowing my sadness and hurt gave me a disadvantage and gave him all the power here. I wanted to crawl under the table and hide.