his eyes narrowed to slits of smoke-hazed jet ‘—I’m not prepared to discuss this further. You take my offer, or you leave it. Sleep on it and give me your decision in the morning.’ He turned again, lobbing over his shoulder, ‘I’ll get someone to show you to a room you can use for tonight. We eat at nine, as you may remember, and afterwards you and Roy can have some time together to discuss your futures.’
Dispiritedly, she watched as he strode across the polished terracotta tiles of the airy, square hallway. She had honestly believed she was mature enough now to stand her ground against that overweening authoritarianism of his—that she would never again allow him to tell her what to do, where to go.
Yet she had to admit, after one of the maids—new since her own departure, just over a year ago—had shown her to a bedroom overlooking the courtyard at the back of the house, that her interview with Roman had sapped her of the energy she would have needed to arrange for a taxi to pick her up here and drive her back to Jerez, where she would have had to find overnight accommodation.
Also, this way she was guaranteed some time with her twin. She could sit through dinner with Don˜a Elvira and the dreadful aunts for the sake of the opportunity to speak to Roy alone afterwards. If she insisted on leaving now, Roman would make sure she didn’t get so much as a glimpse of her brother.
She needed to apologise in person for having failed him. Break the news that Roman would be bringing charges against him. It made her sick just to think of it. She’d been looking out for him ever since their mother had died a few days before their eighth birthday, but the price Roman was demanding was way too high. She had worked hard to turn her life around. How could anyone expect her to put herself back in the prison she’d escaped from a year ago?
Her pale face set, she gave the room she’d been shown to a cursory glance. It was very similar to the one she’d used when she’d spent the greater part of her two years of marriage here. Roman had simply dumped her, leaving her with his mother and the aunts while he’d been away doing his own thing. Business in Jerez and Cadiz, with plenty of fringe benefits in the form of fancy restaurants, fancy females, climbing in the Himalayas, skiing at Klosters—whatever turned him on.
Shrugging, consigning her memories back into the past, she unpacked her overnight bag. Cotton night-dress, a change of underwear, make-up and toiletries. Her heart hovering somewhere beneath the floorboards, she went to the adjoining bathroom for a much-needed shower and wished she and her twin had never heard of Roman Fernandez.
Candles—dozens of them—set in shallow crystal bowls imparted a warm, flickering glow to the old silver of the elaborate place settings. Dinner at Las Colinas Verdes was always a formal affair and tonight all the stops had been pulled out because there were two guests.
Herself the unwanted one. And Delfina The Desirable, who had been flavour of the month amongst Roman’s female relatives for as long as Cassie had known them.
Roman was seated at the head of the long table with the Spanish woman on his left. Delfina was as exquisite as Cassie recalled, her dark hair cut in a fashionable jaw-length bob, her slender figure clothed in ruby satin, leaving the delicate sweep of her shoulders and arms bare.
‘You are looking well, Cassandra. Better than I have seen you. You are obviously happier in your own country.’ Don˜a Elvira, remote and dignified in black silk, was seated at the foot of the table, to Cassie’s right. Her remark was made in her perfect English and carried the customary barb.
‘Thank you.’ Cassie inclined her head coolly. She could have answered that she would have been ecstatically happy in Spain if her husband had loved her, if his family had accepted her. But what was the point raking over a past that was dead and buried as far as she was concerned? She would not let this ordeal undermine her hard-won poise. She wouldn’t let any one of them intimidate her now.
Tía Agueda and Tía Carmela, Roman’s aunts, were seated opposite, their small dark eyes constantly flicking between Cassie and Delfina. Delfina was speaking in animated Spanish to Roman who, naturally, took pride of place at the head of the gleaming mahogany table. Her hand was continually moving to touch the back of his, or to linger on the white fabric of his sleeve, as if to emphasis a point she was making, her dark eyes flicking and flirting beneath the lustrous sweep of her lashes.
During her time in Spain Cassie had picked up enough of the language to get by, but the other woman’s voice was pitched too low, too soft and intimate to allow her to hear what was being said.
She fingered the stem of her wine glass and, as if noting the unconsciously nervous gesture, Don˜a Elvira said, ‘It is an uncomfortable time for all of us.’
And wasn’t that the truth? Cassie speared a sliver of tender pork fillet. Her twin was conspicuous by his absence. House arrest, he’d told her. He probably had to eat in the kitchen with the servants. She laid down her fork, the food unwanted.
‘I’ll be returning to England tomorrow,’ she stated, squashing the wicked impulse to tell her mother-in-law of her son’s attempt to blackmail her into resuming their marriage. Only for three short months—but, even so, Don˜a Elvira and the aunts would hate that. They were probably already counting down to when Roman could be free of his unsuitable, hopeless wife and they could begin pressing him to marry someone of his own nationality, someone with breeding and lots of lovely old money!
Something clicked inside her brain. Of course! She could see it all now. Roy’s fall from grace had given Roman the leverage he needed. It wasn’t just sexual curiosity about her, as he’d so insultingly claimed—his family must be nagging him again to produce an heir, and this time he could put them off if it appeared that he was having another stab at making his marriage work!
Sharply, her mind skidded back to the afternoon Roman had proposed to her. The older family members had been taking a siesta; Roy and Guy—Cindy’s older brother—had taken a couple of horses out onto the campos while Cindy and her mother were upstairs packing. About to follow suit—the month-long holiday was over and they were leaving for home the next day—she’d been halfway up the handsomely carved staircase when Roman’s softly voiced request had stopped her in her tracks.
‘Cassie, got a few minutes to spare?’
Her hand had shot out and tightened on the polished banister until her knuckles stood out like white sea-shells as a wave of raw heat flooded her body. She had been sure she was in love with him, helplessly and hopelessly in love, and it had turned her into a gibbering idiot when he was around.
Cindy had said, ‘Mucho macho!’, pretending to swoon. ‘He doesn’t even notice me but he follows you with his eyes, you lucky pig!’
Trying not to think of the gross stupidity of that remark—why should a man as gorgeous, as self-assured and wildly wealthy as Roman spare a very ordinary woman with no social skills and about as much sex appeal as a carrot a second glance?—she had waited until the gauche heat ebbed from her face before slowly turning.
He had been watching her from the foot of the stairs. Watching. Waiting. Her throat muscles had gone into spasm.
‘I want to talk to you.’
‘Yes?’ Had her expression been intelligent, or just plain dumb? The latter, she suspected, because the slight shake of his dark, handsome head, the very slight abrasiveness of his voice had suggested impatience.
‘Not here. In the courtyard, for privacy. Come down.’
She’d gone; of course she had. If he’d asked her to walk to the North Pole with him she’d have gone without
