Her Latin Lover (Contemporary Romance) (14 page)

Occasionally, it was hard to avoid him though, such as one afternoon when she was in the middle of grooming a horse out in the yard and Paulo came outside to talk to Carlos about the stables. It would have looked ridiculous if she’d suddenly stopped and she couldn’t ask Paulo to go away as it was his house. She just continued brushing the horse and tried desperately to ignore him. However, it was hard. Every time she heard his rich, deep voice she found herself catching her breath. It was even worse now that she could understand almost every word that he was saying in Spanish to Carlos. She looked at him from round the side of the stallion’s shoulder. She could see that he’d taken his jacket off and thrown it over a rail that they used for tethering the horses. She listened to him talking to Carlos about the weather and how some of the heat seemed to be rising up from the valleys. Mary was feeling hot herself and the exertion she was putting into brushing down the horse meant that there were small beads of sweat on her forehead.

She heard Paulo say that in weather like this, there was no reason why the men shouldn’t take their shirts off if it made them feel more comfortable. Mary looked round the side of the horse again and this time she saw Paulo slowly unbutton his shirt and peel it away from his broad back. He stretched his arms. She could clearly see the perfectly contoured lines of his naked chest and his powerful, bare arms. She could even just make out the bright pink scar above his muscular forearm where Leon had shot him. Mary gulped, but her throat was dry. She looked around for some water, but she’d left her water bottle on the other side of the yard, right next to where Paulo was standing, semi-naked.

As if reading her mind, Paulo bent down and picked up her water bottle. He took a long, deep swig from it. Mary watched his Adam’s apple moving up and down as he gulped back the cool, refreshing liquid. She rested her head against the horse’s warm, silky body. The animal’s heart was beating loudly inside.

“Maria,” Carlos called out. He, like Javier and Isabella, refused to call her Mary. “Haven’t you finished with that horse yet?” he asked in Spanish. He had a strong local accent that Mary struggled with at first, but she was more or less used to it now.

Mary moved around the horse’s neck to tell him that she still had to do the feet. She did her best to compose herself before looking directly at Paulo and his exposed body, but when she looked up, he had gone and was nowhere to be seen.

After that afternoon, Mary did her best to avoid any proximity to him. However, there was still the issue of her flight and her delayed return to London to sort out. The only person who could help her with both of these problems was Paulo. Therefore, one afternoon, at exactly the same time that she should’ve been boarding her plane to Heathrow, she went to see him in his study.

She knew he was in there because Isabella had just returned to the kitchen with his lunch dishes. Mary was about to knock on the door, when she stopped and wiped off some of her lipstick with the back of her hand. However, she couldn’t rub off the mascara as easily and regretted putting it on. She also wished she hadn’t sprayed on so much perfume. It wasn’t as if she wanted to look attractive for him, she merely wanted to ask him a few practical questions. She considered going upstairs, washing it all off and changing out of her short, flimsy dress and into a pair of jeans and a plain T-shirt. However, if she did, she might miss her chance to speak to him as he often went out in the afternoon to inspect his estate and visit some of the farmers.

She took a deep breath and knocked on the dark wood of the door.

“Come him,” he called out.

Mary turned the door handle and walked in. The seat behind the large desk in front of her was empty. She looked around and spotted Paulo reclining in a large leather armchair in the corner of the room, sipping coffee.

“I hope I’m not disturbing you,” she said, though she could see that she quite obviously wasn’t.

“Not at all. I was just digesting a most delicious lunch.”

“Did you like it? I made it all myself. Isabella showed me how to season and tenderize the meat and I’ve also learnt how to . . .” Mary stopped herself, remembering Paulo’s comment about the judge not asking her about her cooking techniques.

“You are an excellent cook. Your Spanish is also coming along extremely well. You seem to have a natural talent for languages.”

“Thank you. I’ve worked as hard as I can on it, though I’m nowhere near good enough yet to answers questions in court.”

“You’re probably already better than you think and there’s still a week to go. Would you like to practise some example questions now?”

“OK. Then I need to ask you about my flight.”

“Come and sit down.” He pulled up a chair very close to his own. Mary sat down. Her knees were almost touching his.

Paulo began to ask her questions in Spanish. He started off by asking her name and where she was from. He then asked her where she was staying in the region, why she had come to South America and how she’d met Paulo.

Mary answered all the questions with ease as she’d rehearsed most of them already, though she hesitated when it came to describing her first encounter with Paulo. She recalled how she initially thought of him as a bit of a bandit, especially with the deep scar across his face, albeit a rather sexy bandit. She then remembered how extremely sexy he’d proven himself to be when they danced at the fiesta and when he kissed her before they set off to the festivities. However, she said none of this in her answers. Instead, she kept it factual and to the point.

“You’ve asked me a lot of questions. How about I ask you a few?” she said even though she knew that this had nothing to do with the trial.

He agreed and she asked him about Leon, Clara and why Leon was so interested in her. Paulo sat back in his armchair and explained everything to her in a mixture of Spanish and English. He told her about how he, Clara and Leon had grown up together and how he and Clara had grown closer together, while at the same time Clara and Leon grew further apart. He then explained what happened the night of the car accident. When he finally finished, he stood up and poured himself a glass of brandy from a crystal decanter that stood on a table on the other side of the room, near the desk.

“How terrible,” Mary said.

Paulo offered her a glass a brandy. She wasn’t much of a spirit drinker, but she accepted. It seemed rude to let him drink on his own in his grief and there were no other drinks on the table that she could see. She took a sip and felt it burn as it trickled down her throat.

“Why didn’t you do anything about it? If I’d been you, I would’ve killed him.” She said, choking back some more brandy.

“Mary, you did kill him.” Paulo said. However, this time he didn’t accuse her of the crime. He just smiled at her and poured them both another glass.

“Yes, but what I did wasn’t premeditated murder.” Mary slipped back into English and made a mental note to look up the phrase “premeditated” in her dictionary later on for the trial. “He planned to murder Clara. He undid her seat belt so that she would be thrown from the car.” She saw Paulo wince at the idea. “Why didn’t you confront him?” she pressed on.

“I did. The next day, when I should have been getting married instead of attending a funeral, I asked Leon why he did such a thing. We fought. He broke a wine bottle and attacked me with it.” Paulo gestured at the scar on his face. “It was lucky that he didn’t have a gun and that my father walked into the room just in time to stop him.” Paulo then went on to explain how his father banished Leon from the house and how Leon, the disinherited son, went on to build up his own estate based on violence.

“What did he want with me? He seemed to think that I was Clara. He kept on calling me by her name the other night.” Mary was getting a much better idea of what had been going on, including where Paulo got his scar from, but there were still several things that she didn’t understand. “If he loved Clara, why was he threatening me?” she asked.

Paulo explained how Leon thought that she was her avenging spirit that he had to master and subdue. However, Paulo left out the more explicit sexual measures that Leon had wanted to take in order to achieve his goals.

“And what do you think?” she asked

“Do I think that you are Clara’s spirit, or do I think that you need subduing?”

“Both,” she replied and moved just a tiny fraction forward, but it was enough to make their knees touch.

“I’ve told you before that you look similar to Clara, but you are a completely different person, and I mean that in a very positive way.” The dark, smouldering look had returned to his eyes.

“And do I need subduing?” She swirled what was left of the brandy in her glass. A small drop spilled onto her bare thigh, just below the hem of her dress. She wondered if the brandy had made her reckless. However, she hadn’t been drinking the other afternoon when she saw him half naked in the stables and she certainly burned with desire for him then.

“I think that you will only let someone subdue you once you are willing to be subdued,” he replied. He leaned forward and slowly wiped away the brandy from her leg with his index finger.

Mary learned back in her chair and let Paulo’s hands explore more of her bare thighs. It wasn’t long before he was on her and together they released all their pent up frustration and cravings in a great torrent of desire until all that was left were two exhausted, naked bodies lying side by side on the ancient oriental rug of his study.

When Mary woke up it was dusk. She rolled over onto Paulo and kissed him.

“Maybe we could eat dinner together this evening,” she suggested as she nibbled on his earlobe.

“I would like that very much,” he replied. However, he didn’t get up and put on his clothes. Instead, he rolled her over and made love to her again, only this time it was slow and gentle, like the last dance of an evening when couples come together and hold each other tight before setting out into the dark, silent night.

It was late by the time they finally emerged from his study, both of them radiating a warm glow that was unmistakable to anyone who saw them. It certainly did not go unnoticed by Isabella who decided to lay out a full dinner in the dining room complete with flowers and candles.

“How did she know?” Mary asked.

“Isabella might not be married, but she is not innocent,” Paulo answered tucking into a very large portion of almost rare meat. “However, she won’t approve of you staying in my bedroom tonight.”

“Does it matter? It’s your house.” Mary couldn’t believe that this strong, powerful man was acting like a teenage school boy, scared that his mum would catch him making out with his girlfriend.

“It’s Isabella’s house too. She has lived here almost as long as I have.”

“Yes, but she’s not your mother.” Even if she was, Mary couldn’t see what the problem was. After all, Paulo was a man who was past thirty and surely capable of deciding whether or not he could have a woman spend the night in his room, and Mary could think of nothing better than waking up in the morning with Paulo’s arms around her.

“Maria,” Paulo said, using the Spanish form of her name for the first time. It sounded so much sweeter and tenderer than plain Mary. “This is a very conservative country and Isabella is a strict Catholic. I would not want to offend her by having you share my bed.”

“So, it’s OK for us to do it in your study in the middle of the day, but not OK for us to do it in your bedroom at night? Is that what you’re saying?” Mary thought that the whole situation seemed a bit ridiculous.

“Isabella can quite clearly see that our friendship has become more intimate. However, she does not know the level of intimacy. She would presume that it has gone no further than kissing. She would not approve of anything more.”

“So you’re saying that she doesn’t approve of sex before marriage?” Mary replied.

“That’s a very succinct way of putting it, but essentially, yes, that is it.” Paulo had finished the last of the meat on his plate and set down his knife and fork.

“And what do you think?” Mary asked.

“I think that I wouldn’t have made love to you this afternoon, if I didn’t love you.” Paulo leaned across the table and gave her a long, lingering kiss.

Chapter 14

The next morning Mary woke up in her bed on her own. She liked Isabella and had become close to her over the last week as they worked together in the kitchen and around the house. She didn’t want to do anything to offend that kind woman, even if it meant doing without Paulo at night.

She was just about to get up when the handle of her bedroom door turned and in walked Paulo with a large tray of breakfast and hot coffee.

“Where would you like your breakfast? Sitting by the window, enjoying the view, or in bed?” he asked.

“In bed, definitely in bed,” she said. She sat up and arranged a few pillows behind her.

“Of course, but only on one condition.”

“What is it?” She noticed that he had that deep sexy look in his eyes.

“That I get into bed with you!”

Mary pulled back the bed covers and welcomed him in.

When she finally ate her breakfast, it was stone cold.

Later, once they were both downstairs, Mary raised the long overdue subject of her trial and her return to England. Since the fiesta, Mary had been living an almost unreal life in Paulo’s hacienda up in the rarefied air of the coffee-growing hills, where the worst that had happened to her all week was a soufflé refusing to rise. After she and Paulo came together, the dream-like quality of her existence only intensified. She supposed that if the police had put her in jail, the enormity of her situation would’ve hit her more strongly. She’d done her best to learn Spanish, but if she was honest with herself, she was driven more by a desire to show off to Paulo than a desire to get through the trial. However, sooner or later she would have to face up to reality, especially as the trial was in less than a week.

“I need to talk to you about the court case,” she said to Paulo as they walked down a path that led away from his house. In the distance she could hear Javier yelling at Carlos; something to do with him not having mucked out one of the stables. It was a job that she normally did first thing in the morning. “Maybe I should go back and help them?” she asked.