The Spaniard's Love-Child (3 page)

Over my dead body.
‘Nobody's doing anything until the morning,' Nell told the girl calmly.

T
HE
door opened before Raul had a chance to ring the bell. He sensed she had been waiting for him, watching through the window perhaps, for his car to draw up? He spared a passing thought for his car parked at that moment in a less than salubrious area, and turned his attention to the young woman standing in the doorway.

A woman who looked like this and was prepared to exploit it, as Nell Rose had already proved herself willing and able to do, did not need to live in such a place. There would be men—men like his brother—more than happy to house her in relative luxury, though she would have to make a little more effort with her appearance, he thought, studying her critically. Because whatever else Nell Rose had been doing while she'd waited for him, it had not involved a comb! Her red-gold hair stood like a fiery nimbus around a porcelain-pale face.

The women he became involved with did not have tangled hair; they were well groomed, attractive, intelligent and no more interested in long-term commitment than he was.

It was conceivable their hair might be messy in the morning, but it was not Raul's habit to spend the entire night with a woman. He rose early, and the idea of small talk over breakfast did not appeal to him.

As if sensing his silent condemnation the diminutive redhead lifted her hand to push back the mesh of red-gold waves from a heart-shaped face. Raul, his attention mo
mentarily diverted, was struck by the extreme slenderness of her small-boned wrist.

Her hands, like her bare feet, were narrow and small, and, wearing those slightly ridiculous oversized pyjamas emblazoned with teddy bears, she didn't actually look very much older or sophisticated than his rebellious niece. The woman seemed to possess chameleon-like qualities, but Raul knew Nell Rose could look very different.

His mind drifted back to the day he had seen her on the beach with his brother. Her sleek, rounded curves had been revealed in a bikini of petite and provocative proportions. He had watched as she had stretched with lazy feline grace in the sun before rolling over to whisper something in his brother's ear.

Javier's reply had made her set off down the beach with him in hot pursuit. He had caught up with her at the water's edge. Raul had been able to hear her laughs and screams as Javier had picked her up, from where he had been standing in the sand dunes. When Javier had strode into the sea until they'd both been immersed by the waves, he had turned and walked swiftly away.

It had been painful for him to see the brother he'd admired and respected making a fool of himself over a girl who'd been so obviously out for what she could get. A girl who'd been far too young for him. He'd only considered for a split second the clearly preposterous possibility that what had actually bothered him was the fact that Javier had seemed to be having so much fun being a fool.

On the day of the funeral she had looked much more demure, but Raul had known what sort of woman lurked behind the modest suit and sweetly sad expression. The few tendrils of hair that had escaped the severe chignon had been bright against the back of the slim-fitting suit she had
worn, the light application of blusher along her cheekbones had served to emphasise her extreme pallor.

Raul's expression hardened as he dragged his mind back to the present and his eyes back to her face. Someone lacking his knowledge of her history would have been unable to reconcile this unsophisticated figure before him with a young woman who had at eighteen cleverly inveigled her way into a recently bereaved man's home, bed and heart. To be able to disguise such ruthless self-interest behind a guileless façade would be truly an asset, he decided cynically.

‘Miss Rose…'

Did she, he wondered, cultivate that candid and rather unnervingly direct blue gaze? He saw an expression of impatience flicker in the cornflower-blue eyes; his own eyes narrowed.

Raul was not unnerved, nor even intrigued by the wide-eyed stuff. His glance slid dismissively over the suggestion of slight curves beneath the voluminous nightgear. No doubt there were men whose chivalrous instincts were aroused by such fragility, but his instincts, protective or otherwise, were not excited by this style of delicate vulnerability.

‘Keep your voice down,' she hissed, glancing over her shoulder.

Raul, unaccustomed to being on the other end of an order, stiffened in astonishment to hear the terse note of command in her low-pitched voice.

‘Are the children ready?'

‘No, they're not.' Nell smiled to take the sting out of her admission as she struggled to maintain her composure, at least outwardly.

Inside she did not have the luxury of pretence; the instant she had laid eyes on him standing there like some avenging
angel on her doorstep every protective instinct she possessed had awoken. So had a lot of other instincts, but Nell couldn't see that dwelling on those was going to help the present situation.

She was frustrated by the inherent weakness responsible for her turbulent pulse-rate and unsteady hands, but not surprised by it. There was nothing subtle about what Raul Carreras oozed, unless you considered being hit over the head by a large blunt object subtle! And Nell seriously doubted if her response to his brand of raw sexuality made her in any way unique.

‘I thought I had made my wishes clear.'

It was obvious from his tone that it had not for one second even crossed his mind that anyone would ignore an instruction he had given, no matter how misjudged said instruction might be.

‘You did,' she agreed placidly. ‘But I thought it wasn't a good idea,' she elaborated.

Raul stared at her. ‘
You
thought…?'

Was he outraged at the idea she could think, or the fact she had dared think something he didn't want her to? It was his expression of total astonishment that made her annoyance tip over into amusement.

Her grin produced a predictable gleam of awakening anger in his deep-set eyes—this was not a man to whom laughing at himself came easily. Nell arranged her features in a suitably sober expression. There was no point deliberately antagonising him and, she reminded herself, his night had been even more hellish than her own. Under the circumstances the guy was allowed not to be in the mood to party or even smile, she thought, studying his magnificently brooding profile. God, but he really was something extra special.

Being a fair-minded person, Nell knew that if he'd been
anyone else she'd have automatically cut him a bit of slack without a second thought. The problem was he wasn't anyone else.
The fact is,
she told herself,
you can't allow your judgement to be clouded by his sexual charisma.
You couldn't hold a man personally responsible for looking like your fantasy dream lover and then compounding the crime by ruining the illusion when he opened his mouth.

Maybe that was just as well, she reflected ruefully; if his personality had turned out to be as sublimely perfect as his raw, rampantly male looks, the fact he was totally unattainable to someone like herself would have been seriously tragic.

The thought of how unspeakably awful it must have been for him to think, even temporarily, that the children had been snatched brought a sympathetic warmth to her expression of which she was totally unaware as she read her hormones a firm lecture on self-control.

‘Look, I really don't think you've thought this through,' she told him kindly. ‘Why don't we talk about it? Would you like to come in?' She stepped a little to one side.

‘There is nothing to
think through
and I should
like
to take the children back home in my car, which is no doubt being vandalised.'

His continued inexplicable antagonism was beginning to really niggle her. ‘Oh, it's your
car
you're worried about.' She regretted the childish retort the moment it escaped her lips. ‘And here was me thinking it was Kate and Antonio,' she finished in defiance of his glowering disapproval.

One strongly delineated dark brow lifted. ‘Frankly, Miss Rose, I do not think my worries are any of
your
concern.' His fine nostrils quivered as he looked contemptuously down his patrician nose at her.

His dismissive attitude brought a flush to Nell's cheeks. For someone she associated with emotional detachment,
there was something inescapably personal about the unconcealed contempt in his voice and manner.

A natural optimist, blessed with an easygoing nature, Nell had managed to go through life without making enemies. Finding herself on the receiving end of such hostility wasn't pleasant. Did he treat everyone this way or was she receiving special treatment? She didn't crave Raul Carreras's approval, but if his antipathy was personal it wasn't going to help her advocacy of the children's case.

‘Kate and Antonio are my concern though.' The mystery was no longer why Katerina had run away from her uncle, but why it had taken her so long! Imagining her own fate in the hands of such a man sent a shiver down Nell's spine.

The grim smile that curved his wide, sensual mouth was without humour as he coldly replied, ‘Thankfully that is not true.' Nell opened her mouth to contradict him, but was forestalled by his smooth and astonishing addition. ‘You are my dead brother's ex-mistress, a position I think you'll find will carry very little weight legally or otherwise.'

Mistress!

Now the explanation for his attitude had revealed itself Nell didn't know why she was so astounded, or why this possibility hadn't occurred to her earlier. It wasn't as if this were the first time some ill-informed person had assumed Javier and she had been lovers.

Even though it seemed laughably preposterous to her, if she thought about it objectively Nell could see how they got there. They had shared a house, not had other partners and, despite the age gap, Javier had been a very attractive man, though not admittedly in the same class as his younger brother.

But then who was?

Nell scanned the lean, dark and permanently bad-tempered features of Raul Carreras from under the protec
tive shield of her lashes. He might be an overbearing pain, but there was no denying the man really did have raw sex appeal coming out of his pores. As gorgeous as he was to look at, in Nell's eyes his staggering beauty didn't compensate for him being a humourless, stuck-up bully.

A thoughtful expression on her face, she tried to figure out how he had come to the conclusion she and Javier had been lovers. Though she had never personally met the man up until the day of the funeral she did know that he and Javier had met up infrequently. Nell could recall thinking it was touching when she had learnt that Javier's younger brother had broken ranks and did have contact with the estranged member of the family.

Had Javier said something during one of their infrequent meetings that his brother had misinterpreted? If he had realised, Javier, who had been
extremely
protective of her reputation, would no doubt have put him straight. Javier on the surface, unorthodox and caring little for convention, actually never stopped being essentially a Spanish male, and as such he held some quaintly old-fashioned ideas about a woman's reputation. He had been much more concerned about what people might think than she had been.

As far as Nell herself was concerned the people that mattered knew the only interest Javier had in her was mildly paternal, and, besides, the sort of people that thought ill of her were not the sort of people she cared much about anyway.

‘It has been a trying evening, Miss Rose. I think you'll find it is imprudent to try my patience.'

Nell's dazed gaze focused openly on his dark face. Nell didn't have much practice at hating but in that split second as their eyes meshed the dislike she felt for him hardened into something far more implacable than mere dislike. Raul
Carreras was not the sort of man who inspired tepid emotions.

Until that moment she had fully intended to set him straight, but that changed too. Her full mouth arranged itself into a mutinous line. Let him think what he liked; she didn't owe him any explanation.

‘Is that a threat?' she enquired quietly.

‘It is a statement of fact.'

‘Will you lower your voice? I have neighbours, you know.'

‘I would have thought that in an area such as this noise is the least of the neighbours' problems.' Every time Raul thought of the children walking through such an area in the middle of the night his blood ran cold.

‘Why, you snob!' she exclaimed contemptuously.

A muscle clenched in his lean cheek as Raul studied her angry face with an air of baffled frustration. He ran a hand down the back of his sleek dark hair before rubbing it along the stubble that dusted his angular jawline.

‘Would you be happy to walk alone here at night?'

‘I have done.' No need to mention she had not done so out of choice and had been extremely uneasy.

‘Then you are a fool,' he condemned.

No, just a liar.
‘You're entitled to your opinion.'
And don't you enjoy sharing it?

‘I am willing to overlook your involvement in tonight's events,' he revealed in the manner of someone making a major concession. ‘However, there are limits to my patience,' he revealed in a colourless, bored tone.

‘Involvement?'
she queried sharply. ‘Listen, I realise having someone to blame means you don't have to examine your own behaviour, but I didn't volunteer to be your scapegoat.'

‘I am not suggesting you planned what happened.'

Planned?
Good God! Was that what he was thinking? ‘That's
terribly
good of you,' she choked with leaden irony.

‘You expect me to believe you didn't plant the idea in Katerina's head? Oh, I'm sure you were subtle,' he conceded nastily. ‘A word here, a word there…' His eyes narrowed suspiciously. ‘I don't know what you think you'll gain from exploiting the fondness my niece and nephew have for you? However, I think you should remember that I am not my brother.'