Читать книгу Modern Romance January Books 1-4 - Кейт Хьюит - Страница 16

MATÍAS CURSED HIMSELF. He called himself every kind of fool imaginable.

She was a woman.

It was so clear now that he was looking at her. Now that she was standing there, bathed in firelight.

How could he not have seen it? How could it have escaped his notice until now? It was all painfully clear, here in the firelight, in this quiet house with shock coursing through his veins. With that soft touch echoing over his skin, a ripple on the surface of the water that should not have been there.

Then Cam had taken a step backward, and something about the way the light had caught that stubborn face, that strong bone structure, had suddenly revealed what he had missed all this time.

His stable boy was not a boy at all.

And he had spoken to her so openly, freely. As though she were an extension of the wallpaper in the room, because to him she might as well have been. A boy who worked for him was beneath his notice. But this...a liar. A treacherous woman.

He would not have spoken to her so.

“Answer me,” he said, tightening his hold on her arms.

Definitely her arms.

It was so apparent now. She did not possess the frame of a young boy, not really. But of course, when he had held her yesterday after her injury he had been thinking only of her safety, not of the way that she was built.

She was strong. Of course she was. She had become so working with horses, he assumed, but it was not the strength of a rangy youth.

She was soft. And no amount of hard labor could disguise that.

He examined her face, and it struck him with full force. As though he had been looking at one of those trick images and had seen one version of it, only to be shown the other. And now he could not go back to seeing the first. Her face was square, her chin strong, her dark brows thick, and in a very basic sense those things lent her a masculine quality.

Combine that with baggy clothes and the disguised female figure, and he supposed at a glance anyone could be forgiven for mistaking her for a boy.

But not now that he was looking at her. Really looking.

Her cheekbones were too fine. That strong bone structure in her face the kind that supermodels would envy, the kind that with makeup would give a dramatic effect of hollows and angles.

It was not a soft beauty. And in many ways, perhaps it would not be considered beauty by most.

He had no idea what to think as he felt like she had just sprouted a second head. Anger. He felt anger. Because he could not cope with being tricked by two people, not in the same moment. Three, if he counted the treachery of his brother, who did not even have the cojones to make a phone call himself.

Of course, if anyone but Liliana had been on the other end of the line he simply wouldn’t have believed it.

“Did you help my brother gain access to this place? Are you a spy? Is that why you were sent here?”

Suddenly, it all made more sense. The way the boy—no, she was not a boy—the way she had asked him questions. About why he didn’t hire women. About why he needed to marry. She had been gauging the situation. Of course she had been.

He had been infiltrated. And everyone involved would pay.

“I was not,” she said. Her eyes were glittering now, and he noted that she denied nothing. He had leveled no specific accusations against her beyond the possibility of her being a spy, had said nothing of her gender, but it fascinated him to see her nearly transform beneath his touch. It seemed as though her face had softened, her voice slightly higher now. “It had nothing to do with your brother or Liliana. I had nothing to do with that.”

“If that is so, then why are you here?”

“I came because of the horses. That much was true.” She swallowed hard, looking up at him, those dark eyes filled with unshed tears now. “I’m Cesar Alvarez’s daughter. Those horses were mine, and I would do anything to be back with them. Surely you must understand that. It had nothing to do with you. It was all for them. All for me.”

He wasn’t sure if he believed her. If she was truly motivated by her love for the horses. Because what he knew about Cesar Alvarez was that the man had been in incredible debt.

His daughter would have no money to her name at all and would most definitely be susceptible to a man like his brother.

“I swear to you,” she said, her expression getting desperate, “I had nothing to do with Liliana or Diego. I don’t know your brother. I’ve never interacted with him. I came here for my own purposes. Because I would do anything for those horses. To make sure that Fuego’s purpose isn’t squandered. The horses are all I have left. My mother has gone off to Paris. You can check on that and see that it’s true. You can check my phone records, anything that you want, and they will prove that I never spoke to your brother. I have been in contact with no one since I came here, and nobody knows that I’m here.”

She seemed to regret making that admission to him. Seemed to regret letting him know that were she to disappear here on this mission, no one would be any the wiser as to where she had gone. He wondered then if he looked as frightening as his father used to look when he was in a rage.

That should make him back off. Should make him move away from her. And yet, he didn’t.

“How old are you?” he demanded.

“Twenty-two,” she responded, trembling in his arms now.

“A woman. Not a boy. And not a girl.”

“No,” she said.

“You want the horses. You want to train them.”

“I need them,” she insisted, “and they need me. You know that you can’t handle Fuego without me. You know it. You have seen him, and you have seen what happens when others try to work with him. You’re going to have that fool Fernando ride him?”

“Of course not. He was fired directly after what happened yesterday.”

“You know that I’m the only one who can work with him right now.”

“It is so important to you? Because if I don’t manage to defeat my brother then all of this goes to him. Including your horses. That isn’t what you want, is it?”

“No,” she said.

“You have deceived me,” he said, leaning closer to her, relishing the moment when she shrank away from him. Because dammit all, someone should be afraid of his wrath. His brother certainly should be, but the fool wasn’t here.

“I’m sorry. It had nothing to do with you. Or rather, it did. If you would only hire women...”

“I have one use for a woman in my life at the moment. And now I wonder if you and I have a common enough purpose that you might serve me well.”

She shrank back, her expression one of confusion. “I don’t understand.”

“I think you do.” He released his hold on her and took a step back. “It is convenient, in many ways. As a boy you only served one purpose. But as a woman you can serve many. What is your name?” He felt a smile curve his lips. “Your real name.”

“Camilla,” she said. “Camilla Alvarez.”

Camilla Alvarez. Of course. He’d heard about her, though he’d never met her. A spirited horsewoman said to have a near supernatural way with the animals, just as her father had.

A fine match for a man like him, in many ways. Though he had no intentions now of making a permanent arrangement. And yet...that did not negate his need for a bride.

He needed one, and he needed her quickly.

Camilla, it turned out, needed something, too.

That mutual need could be his salvation.

Holding the horses hostage didn’t bother him in the least. He needed to gain control of the family rancho, of the family fortune. Diego had kidnapped his fiancée, and there was no way in hell Matías was going to allow his brother to win.

His path was clear. And the solution to his problem was standing before him, delivered to him at just the appropriate moment.

“Well, Camilla Alvarez. If you want your horses, then I expect something in return. If you wish to remain here, if you wish to train Fuego, then you will be my wife.”