Читать книгу The Spaniard's Pleasure - Ким Лоренс, Маргарет Майо - Страница 15

FLEUR dumped the bowl of blackberries she had just picked from the hedge on the drainer and, pausing only to kick off her Wellingtons, hurried to answer the door.

Smoothing down her hair, she opened the door. ‘Sorry, I was in the garden…’ She stopped, her eyes widening as she identified her visitor. ‘Hello…Tamara, isn’t it?’

Two days after the near-death lake drama and not wet or nearly dead the youngster was revealed as tall and slender with the makings of real beauty in the stunning bones of her softly youthful face and big liquid brown fawn-like eyes.

Just as Fleur had predicted, in a couple of years when those awkward coltish angles softened and the curves filled out Antonio was going to have a whole new set of problems, she reflected, unable to repress an uncharitable smile at the thought.

‘He said I had to come and thank you…’ Looking resentful as only a teenager could, she gestured towards the lane.

Fleur registered the Range Rover, then the outline of a figure in the driver’s seat, and tensed.

‘Like I wasn’t going to say thank you anyway,’ the girl added with a sarcastic sniff. ‘He didn’t have to tell me to.’

‘Would you like to come in?’ Fleur asked, knowing when not to offer an opinion. It wasn’t as though Antonio would thank her for speaking up for him. Antonio who had sent his daughter but not come himself. She would be well within her rights to march up to that car and demand the explanation she deserved!

She didn’t, because that would make him think she gave a damn whether or not he kept his promises.

Her glance flickered covertly towards the parked vehicle. For someone, she mused, who apparently put such great store by good manners, his could do with some work!

Was he sitting out there because he was afraid that she would want to take up where they had left off, which, now she came to think about it, was nowhere. Whatever the reason, he needn’t have worried—she had received the message loud and clear when one of the female gardeners had brought Sandy back the next morning.

Fleur had had no problem translating, ‘To save you the bother of calling for him,’ as, ‘You’ve got no excuse to come calling at the big house now.’ It was clear to her that he considered that kiss a massive lapse of judgement and not a lapse he felt inclined to repeat in the cold light of day.

And neither did she.

Tamara looked curiously past Fleur into the cottage, but shook her head. ‘I’d better not. He’s in a hurry.’

‘Some other time, maybe, and I’m glad you’re feeling better,’ Fleur said.

‘Thanks to you.’ The words were minus the sulky tones that had laced the conversation to this point.

‘You’re welcome,’ Fleur replied cheerfully. ‘But I didn’t actually have much to do with saving you,’ she admitted.

The girl frowned and in the process looked remarkably like a softer version of her father. ‘But…’

‘That was your father,’ Fleur inserted. ‘But then I’m sure you already know that.’ The girl’s expressive face was a fair indication that she knew nothing of the sort, but, pretending not to notice, Fleur added, ‘When he dived down for that last time…’ She closed her eyes, a shudder running through her body as without warning she was back there staring at the still water…waiting and praying.

‘I really thought he wasn’t coming back up…’ She didn’t have to pretend the husky emotion in her voice as her thoughts returned to that awful moment.

Then exhaling a gusty sigh and rubbing her arms, which were covered in a rash of goose-flesh, she lifted her eyes. The astonishment chasing across the youthful features of Antonio’s daughter was almost comical. Clearly this was the first time the girl had realised that the man she claimed to loathe had risked his life for her.

‘Well, he wasn’t, was he? Coming back up, that is—not without you, at any rate.’

Tamara stared at Fleur. ‘But he doesn’t even want me.’

‘Then he has a funny way of showing it.’

‘It’s only a matter of time before he sends me back.’ Fleur could hear the flicker of uncertainty mingled with despair in the young voice.

Her own expression was sympathetic as she suggested, ‘And you think acting like the teenager from hell will speed up the process? Have you thought about being nice, talking to him, telling him how unhappy you are?’

The girl’s brows knit in a frown as she insisted, ‘He doesn’t care about me.’

‘Has he said that?’

‘He doesn’t have to. It’s obvious,’ the youngster retorted defensively. ‘It would have solved his problem if I’d drowned.’

Fleur watched her eyes fill with tears and told herself that the smart thing to do would be to say nothing. Getting involved with the Rochas family was the last thing she wanted to do. She would get no thanks and if anything went wrong—a more-than-likely scenario—she’d be the first person he’d blame.

‘And I suppose you told him that.’ So much for not getting involved, Fleur.

The girl lifted her chin defiantly and shrugged. ‘He didn’t deny it.’

As bad as her father, Fleur thought, stifling a sigh as she studied the stubborn set of the girl’s jaw. ‘Well, he wouldn’t, would he? Not when he’s got that whole macho, man-of-steel-never-explain-yourself-to-anyone thing going on.’

The waspishly exasperated retort drew a reluctant chuckle from the girl. Pausing halfway up the path and unashamedly eavesdropping, Antonio paused. It was the first time he had heard his daughter laugh.

‘Don’t you like him?’

Fleur, surprised by the question, considered it.

‘Your father isn’t the sort of person that people like.’ Like was a tepid term and nothing about Antonio was tepid. She thought about his mouth and the way her insides dissolved when she looked at it and said, ‘He’s the sort of person people love or loathe.’

‘Which camp do you fall into, Fleur?’

The colour flew darkly to Fleur’s cheeks as a tall figure moved from the concealing shadow of a holly bush. He was wearing a grey cashmere sweater, dark, well-tailored casual trousers and a natural air of authority. He looked drop-dead gorgeous. So no change there.

Damn the man, he was always where you didn’t want him to be. He was always making you feel things you didn’t want to feel, she thought with a gulp of sheer despair as she realised that she had no control whatever over her reaction to him.

She had managed to go twenty-five years without feeling primitive sexual awareness so why now? Why him?

One dark brow at a satirical slant, his blue eyes shone with malicious humour as he scanned Fleur’s feverishly flushed face. ‘Or should I not ask?’

‘You’re an expert at doing things you shouldn’t,’ she retorted, then almost immediately wished she hadn’t, because the comment brought his gaze to her mouth and she knew he was thinking about that kiss.

Worse still, so was she!

‘How long have you been standing there?’ she demanded, lifting her chin.

‘How do you think I feel?’ his daughter appealed to Fleur. ‘He never lets me out of his sight, and he won’t let me see my real dad.’

Fleur turned shocked eyes on Antonio. ‘I’m sure that’s not true.’

The girl laughed bitterly. ‘You think that because you don’t know him like I do,’ she claimed.

A very timely reminder, thought Fleur. You don’t know him at all, which made the fact that when he was this close she could think about nothing else but how his body would feel against her own all the more hideously appalling!

‘For the moment it’s better if you settle into your new life.’

The teenager glanced over at Fleur. ‘See…I told you so.’ Then, whipping her head back to her father, she snapped, ‘I don’t want a new life; I liked my old life.’

‘You’ll adapt,’ Antonio told her grimly. ‘How is your leg?’ he said, turning to Fleur.

‘It’s fine. I get the stitches out Thursday.’

‘But it could have been otherwise. Something you might like to remember, Tamara, the next time you feel the urge to demonstrate your independence. It is very often innocent bystanders who get hurt.’

The girl flushed and looked guiltily towards Fleur. ‘It wasn’t my fault.’

‘One of the first lessons you need to learn, Tamara, is that a person, at least one with any guts, takes responsibility for the consequences of their actions and doesn’t try and blame someone else.’

Fleur wasn’t surprised to see the tears spring to the youngster’s eyes. The average hard-bitten board member of a multi-national, she reflected, would have struggled not to be intimidated by his coldly peremptory tone and icy manner.

‘Go wait for me in the car, Tamara,’ he added tiredly as he switched his attention back to Fleur, who wished he hadn’t. The dark shadows under his eyes ought to have made him look haggard, but actually they made him look even more darkly dangerous in a sexy way.

‘I wi—’

Fleur breathed again as his attention switched back to his daughter.

‘You will do as I ask for once and try not to inform every passer-by that you are being kidnapped.’

With one final resentful look at his stern profile, the girl flounced off.

Fleur could not control her exasperation. ‘You’re such a prat!’

His dark head came around with a snap.

Refusing to back down in the face of the astonished hauteur stamped on his autocratic features, she pursed her lips and added firmly, ‘Don’t look at me like that; you are. A grade-A, total and absolute…’ She heaved a sigh and shook her head. ‘I’m wasting my breath, aren’t I?’

Some of the frostiness faded from his dark features as he gave an expressive shrug. ‘I am willing to admit I have flaws.’

She closed her eyes for a split second and thought, No visible ones.

Fleur pushed aside an image of him naked—drawn from her imagination—and, opening her eyes, released a rueful, though not totally convincing, laugh.

‘My, what a concession,’ she retorted huskily.

‘And no experience in being a father.’

She tried very hard not to see the flicker of pain, quickly concealed, that flashed briefly in his eyes. She didn’t want to feel empathy for this man; it was the short route to emotional complications she could do without.

Fleur’s eyes travelled the length of his lean, vital body and she repressed a sigh. Who am I kidding? The man is a walking, breathing complication.

‘Well, talking to her would be a start.’

‘Madre mía…!’ he ejaculated, looking less than grateful for the advice. ‘Do you think I have not tried?’ He took a deep breath and continued in a more moderate tone. ‘It is…difficult. The child resents me.’

Fleur looked at him incredulously. ‘Is it any wonder?’ she asked him. ‘You won’t let her see the man she’s presumably thought of as her father for the past thirteen years. I know your middle name isn’t sensitivity, but for goodness’ sake!’ she breathed, shaking her head in disapproval. ‘Surely you must see…’

‘I see…yes, I do see.’ Sensual lips compressed, he drew a hand across his jaw and glared down at her.

Fleur lifted her brows. ‘You see what?’

‘I see that your officious, meddlesome behaviour is meant to compensate for the fact you appear to have no life of your own.’

You can almost see the superiority oozing from every pore, she thought, feeling something snap inside as she looked up at him.

‘For your information, I have a life. I have a great life, which was even greater when you weren’t in it.’ Frowning and hoping Antonio had not picked up on the unspoken implication that he had somehow become part of her life, Fleur added belligerently, ‘And while we’re talking about lives, just how great is yours anyhow?

‘Oh, I know you make a lot of money and you swan around being seen in the right places with some girl with a surgically enhanced body draped all over you. But I’d say your lifestyle is the one that warrents a little scrutiny…’ she suggested with a derisive snigger.

‘As for meddlesome,’ she gritted from between clenched teeth, ‘I admit my natural instinct is to pull someone back when they’re about to walk off the side of a cliff.’ Breathless but unrepentant for her rant, she stuck out her chin and promised sweetly, ‘But in future for you I will make an exception. Actually, if you like I’ll point you in the right direction.’

A stunned silence followed her emotional outburst.

It lasted long enough for Fleur to start doubting the wisdom of speaking her mind. Not that she cared if she had offended him or that she didn’t believe what she had said was not essentially true, though she supposed that some of his girlfriends’ assets might conceivably be natural.

Thinking about some of the more spectacular bodies she’d seen Antonio photographed beside sent her mood into a downward spiral. Attached to those bodies were perfect smiles. Women with those sorts of smiles would routinely tell him how marvellous he was and never, ever say something that left the impression they’d quite like to see him jump off a cliff.

‘I had no right to make personal comments.’

It was grudging but definitely an admission. Surprised, but trying hard not to show it, Fleur nodded her head warily.

‘No, you didn’t.’

‘You really do come out fighting, don’t you…querida?’

And he sounded as if he admired the fact…Every time she thought she had a handle on this man, he did or said something that made her realise he was not always what he seemed.

‘Just because you’re frustrated doesn’t give you the right to take it out on me.’

His heavy eyelids lowered as his bold glance drifted down her body. When he reached her toes he began to work his way up again, really slowly. The action had the result of making Fleur painfully aware of every inch of her body and the way it was reacting to his scrutiny, which was stupid because he was probably compiling a mental list of what was wrong with her.

He got back to her face and it turned out he hadn’t been compiling a list of faults.

He fixed her with a gleaming predatory stare that made her sensitive tummy quiver. His voice was a low, throaty purr as he asked, ‘Has it occurred to you that you’re part of the reason I’m frustrated?’