surely that was better than Natalie making a huge mistake and marrying a man she didn’t love? Better to call the wedding off now than to face a costly divorce—costly in more ways than financial—maybe just months from now? But her father was looking as if the end of the world had come and…
Alexa had no chance to think things through further because at that moment Santos’s firm grip on her arm propelled her forward so that she was standing just in front of him, facing the gaping congregation.
‘Natalie is not coming,’ he said coolly. ‘She has run out on me—that is what her sister came here to tell me. And now she’s going to explain it all to you.’
A forceful little push made her take another step forward in the same moment that it pointedly told her that now was the time for her to speak—to tell everyone the truth.
But what was the truth? Suddenly Alexa was not quite sure. She only knew that it had been obvious that Natalie didn’t want to go through with the wedding. But why had she ever agreed to it in the first place? That question made the earth seem to shift beneath her feet. But she didn’t have time to consider the possible implications of that before her father found his voice.
‘Alexandra? What is happening?’
‘Tell him,’ Santos prompted harshly when she still hesitated. ‘Tell them.’
‘I’m afraid San—Señor Cordero is right…’
The way that her words echoed round the silent church had an eerie, hollow sound but at least her voice had more strength than she had anticipated and she sounded as if she knew what she was talking about. How far that was from the truth only she knew.
‘Natalie has changed her mind. She doesn’t feel it would be right to marry him. Not when she realises that she truly loves someone else.’
And that at least she could say with conviction. In her mind she still had a clear image of the moment that she had looked into her sister’s hotel room and seen Natalie sitting on the bed, staring at the beautiful wedding dress that hung in the wardrobe, her face pale and drawn, her eyes flooded with tears.
‘I thought I could do this, Lexa,’ her sister had said. ‘I really wanted to—but it just isn’t going to work now. If John hadn’t come into my life I would have gone ahead…but he did…and meeting him has changed everything.’
‘She’s truly sorry to have messed everyone about…but she knew it was better to break it off now than to go into a marriage that she knew wasn’t really right for her—’
‘And she did not have the courage to come and tell me herself?’
It was Santos who spoke, his low, darkly dangerous tone drawing her eyes to his face. The black fury that blazed in those eyes, the bitter, insulted pride that tightened his jaw, turned his mouth to a thin, hard line, sent a shiver down her spine as his hard, unyielding gaze locked with hers. Privately she acknowledged that she couldn’t blame Natalie for not wanting to face him. When he looked like this she couldn’t imagine why her sister would ever have wanted to marry him in the first place.
‘No,’ she managed uncomfortably. Natalie hadn’t even dared to face her mother and father with the truth. ‘I’m sorry.’
If the slight inclination of his proud head was meant to be an acknowledgement of her apology then it failed to have any impact. There was no lightening of the coldness of his eyes, no easing of the tightness of every muscle in his powerful frame. And to think that she had once worried that the news of Natalie’s flight might hurt him!
This man looked as if nothing could touch him. As if nothing could penetrate that armoured hide and reach through to find his heart. Right now he didn’t even look as if he had a heart to touch.
‘So where is Natalie now?’
Another question from her father drew Alexa’s attention back to where Stanley was standing, hands clenched tightly together, a frown creasing his forehead.
‘On her way to the airport—no…’
A quick glance at her watch confirmed her suspicion.
‘She must be through to Departures by now. She was getting a plane…’
‘Oh, no! Natalie!’
It was Petra Montague, Stanley’s second wife, reacting in exactly the way that Alexa had anticipated that her stepmother would. Her narrow hands had come up before her face, fluttering weakly against her sculpted cheeks. Above the long, dark red nails her wide blue eyes appeared to glisten with tears that she was fighting not to shed.
‘What has she done? What will we do?’
‘Hush, my dear.’ Stanley’s response sounded almost like a reproach rather than an attempt at consolation as he stepped forward to take his wife’s hands in his and hold them tightly, looking deep into her glistening eyes.
‘Petra—don’t…’
Alexa took a couple of steps forward, then stopped, knowing that her stepmother would not want her attempts at comfort. In fact, she would probably repulse them as dramatically as she was now clinging to her husband’s hands and gazing up forlornly into his eyes.
‘Surely it’s better this way than for her to realise later that she’s made a terrible mistake,’ she repeated.
Oh, she was good, Santos told himself, watching the way Alexa had moved forward then hesitated, noting the quiet, soothing note of her voice. Listening to her, watching her, he could almost believe that she was genuine. That she believed every last word of the story that had dropped so convincingly from her pretty mouth.
But of course that couldn’t be true. She had to be in this right up to her elegant neck. She must have known that her sister was going to run out on him; why else would she time her arrival at the church so perfectly that it was impossible for anyone to go after Natalie and bring her back?
They were all in it together—the whole family. And he had been foolish enough to let them persuade him to let his guard down and, for the first time in his life, make a bad decision.
As a wedding present for your bride… He could still hear Petra Montague’s beseeching voice inside his head. You wouldn’t want to see your father-in-law thrown out into the street…
Dios! What had he been thinking? Never before had he paid out anything on a contract before the whole deal was signed and sealed, but this time he’d let his guard slip just a centimetre and the damn Montague family had taken full advantage of it.
‘You must want Natalie to be happy.’
‘She would have been happy with Santos!’ Petra wailed. ‘We would all have been happy with things that way!’
‘But she wasn’t happy,’ Alexa protested. ‘She just didn’t dare say it, once the wedding had been arranged and everything planned.’
From where he stood slightly to the side, all that Santos could see was this Alexa’s face and body in profile, and, having looked at her once, he suddenly found it impossible to look away.
‘Plain’
