asked for my help. I have always been good friends with Cortez, and I persuaded him to swim with me every week. But he is a proud man, who hates his disability, and when he asked me not to discuss his therapy with anyone I felt that I should respect his wish.’
Shame washed over Lauren and she dropped her gaze.
Ramon stared at her downbent head and did not know whether he wanted to kiss her or shake her. At this moment the latter seemed more tempting.
He inhaled sharply. ‘How could you think that I was in any way involved with Pilar?’ he demanded savagely. ‘I have never given you any reason to doubt my commitment to our marriage.’
He hadn’t, Lauren admitted, guilt gnawing at her insides. It had been her and her wretched insecurity that had driven her to think the worst of him. ‘Pilar deliberately put doubts in my mind,’ she muttered. ‘I think she hoped to make trouble between us.’
‘She seems to have succeeded,’ Ramon said tersely. He swung away from her and snatched up a towel. ‘I can’t help feeling that you are always going to punish me for your father’s sins.’
Lauren gave him a startled look. ‘What do you mean?’
‘You don’t trust me. And I’m not sure our marriage can survive without trust. Go back to the castle,’ he ordered her roughly. ‘I am too angry to talk to you right now. I usually play a game of chess with Cortez—and, in case you’re wondering, the only female around will be his housekeeper, who is about ninety-three,’ he finished sardonically.
Ramon did not return for dinner. A member of the castle staff informed Lauren that he had phoned to say he would be dining with Cortez Fernandez. Clearly he was still angry with her, and she could not blame him, she thought miserably as eleven p.m. came and went and he still had not come home. But his explosive tempers did not usually last for long, and, hopeful that they would soon make up after this latest row, she took a bath and afterwards anointed her skin with fragrant oil, before donning the daring black negligee she had bought to please him.
She owed him an apology, she acknowledged as she sat alone on the huge four-poster bed and studied the portrait of Matty that Ramon had commissioned for her. It now hung on the wall, so that it was the first thing she saw when she woke every morning. Even if he did not love her the way she loved him, he had proved over and over that he cared about her and respected her—and she had repaid him with doubt and mistrust that threatened to undermine their marriage.
Racked with guilt, she paced around the bedroom and finally pulled on her robe, intending to wait for him downstairs so that she could greet him when he came home—if he ever did, she thought painfully.
She was shocked to see a light spilling from beneath the door of his study, and after giving a hesitant knock she entered the room. He was sprawled on the sofa, his jacket and tie discarded in a heap on the floor, a glass of whisky in his hand—not the first glass he had drunk, she guessed, glancing at the half-empty bottle on the coffee table.
‘I…I didn’t realise you were back,’ she said shakily, when he turned his head and stared at her through bloodshot eyes.
‘Where else would I be, my darling wife?’ He gave a sardonic laugh. ‘Don’t answer that. I’m sure your fertile imagination can come up with a dozen scenarios, featuring me sleeping with one of the many mistresses that you seem to think I have stashed away.’
‘I am truly sorry that I doubted you,’ Lauren said in a low tone. ‘I had no reason to mistrust you. It was just… when you weren’t at the vineyards, as I had expected, I thought about all the times my father must have lied to my mother—all his affairs that I knew nothing about when I was a child, but which broke her heart. For a few stupid minutes I thought that you were like him, but I know that you’re not,’ she choked, swallowing the tears that suddenly clogged her throat.
Ramon drained his glass and stood up, moving away from her to stand by the window that looked over the dark castle grounds and the shadowy mountains beyond.
‘I should never have forced you to marry me,’ he said abruptly. ‘I can see now that it was a mistake.’
Fear greater than anything she had ever experienced caused the blood to drain from Lauren’s face, and she felt hollow inside, as if her heart had been wrenched from her chest. ‘You didn’t force me—’ she began, but Ramon shook his head.
‘Dios mio, I threatened to fight for custody of our child. I gave you no choice but to be my wife. And now you feel trapped. You asked me once if you were my prisoner,’ he said harshly. ‘The answer is no, Lauren. I will not keep you here against your will any longer.’
She wished he would turn round, so that she could see his expression, because the dark, deadly serious tone in his voice was scaring her to death. ‘I don’t understand,’ she whispered.
He shrugged. ‘I am setting you free. Neither of us can be happy while you continue to be haunted by the way your father treated your mother. You are constantly waiting for me to let you down in some way, and ultimately that lack of trust will destroy our relationship.’
He paused, and then continued in the same emotionless voice. ‘I will agree to a divorce, and to you taking Mateo back to England. All I ask is that you allow me to buy a house for the two of you, and for your agreement that I can visit him often.’
She was so shocked by his stark announcement that she could not speak—couldn’t think. The agonising pain, as if her heart was being crushed in a vice, made it difficult to breathe.
‘I don’t want a divorce,’ she stammered. ‘I would never take Matty away from here—from the castle, and his family, and you. I know how much you love him.’
She broke off when Ramon turned to face her, and the stark wretchedness in his eyes made her want to weep. She knew how much it must have cost him to offer her custody of Matty, to allow her to take his son away. He thought she wanted her freedom, but what she really wanted, needed to do was tell him honestly how she felt about him. She had been a coward for far too long, and had allowed her father’s behaviour to colour her judgement of Ramon, but what they shared was too special to lose.
Courage was hard to find as she stared at the tall, handsome man who was her world. His jaw was tense, his skin drawn tight over his slashing cheekbones. She wished he would smile and hold her, kiss her hair as he did every night as she fell asleep in his arms.
She took a deep breath.
‘I don’t feel trapped. I want to remain married to you because…I love you.’
The silence was so intense that Lauren could hear the ragged sound of her breathing. There was no reaction on his hard face, and his thick lashes hid the expression in his eyes.
‘Some love,’ he said scathingly at last. ‘You say the words, Lauren, but you did not show it today, when you believed that I was having an affair with Pilar.’
Feeling as though she were dying inside, Lauren stared at the floor, willing her tears not to fall until she was alone and could deal with his rejection in private. She did not see him move, and flinched when he slid his hand beneath her chin and tilted her face to his.
‘True love—the kind that lasts for ever—is profound and loving, passionate and tender,’ he said deeply. ‘It is about trust and forgiveness, friendship, and an abiding affection that transcends all life’s problems and disappointments and
