a bid for distraction he picked up one of the newspapers, but it wasn’t the headline that caught his attention, it was the photo of Lydia looking every bit the socialite on a night out. Suspicion and a spark of lust slammed into him hard as he gritted his teeth firmly and looked at the image. A growl of Spanish slipped from him as he read the headline.
Blackmailed into an engagement by Spanish
billionaire looking for unknown half-brother!
The paper shook as he held it, his fingers tightening on the offending pages until they hurt. She’d sold him out. Lydia had gone from his bed straight to the press. Was that why she’d been so keen to leave Madrid, to leave him? Before the headlines broke?
He shouldn’t read it, shouldn’t give it even the smallest bit of his attention, but his eyes began quickly to scan the words even though his emotions, and maybe even his heart, warned against it.
London heiress Lydia Carter-Wilson has been unable to keep the dark family secrets of Spanish business mogul Raul Peréz Valdez.
‘Raul was shocked to discover he had an older brother,’ a reliable source informed.
The only heir to his father’s estate has just discovered the existence of a brother, who will now share the inheritance of his father’s company, Banco de Torrez. The blackmailed bride-to-be is honouring a contract her father had signed with the late Maximiliano Valdez in order to pay off family debts.
Legitimate son, Raul, seems more than happy to marry instead of sharing his inheritance with his half-brother.
A curse left his lips without any thought for those around him. She’d even shamed her father. What kind of a woman did that? A mercenary one who only thought of herself.
Right at this moment he was trapped in a bubble of anger. He’d trusted Lydia, allowed her into his family and, if he was brutally honest, his emotions. She’d got to him on a level he’d never known—and then she’d done this.
He pulled out his phone and with savage satisfaction pressed Lydia’s number. Infuriatingly, she didn’t answer and as the message system kicked in he almost cut the connection, but sense prevailed. The sooner she realised he knew what she’d been up to, the better, but first there was time for a little of her own medicine. Deceit.
‘Lydia. There are papers to sign for your father’s debt. I will see you at twelve forty-five, before I meet Max at one.’
With a satisfied smile he ended the call. He had no doubt she would be there. Just as he had no doubt she would try and deny all knowledge of the article. After all, hadn’t she kept Max’s whereabouts from him for several days before enlightening him—only then she’d made seduction the main game plan? What would her plan be today?
It seemed Miss Carter-Wilson was as cold and calculating as he was and would do anything to extract herself from the debt her father had tied her to—but this time she’d gone too far. This time she’d played with the wrong man and for that she would pay.
* * *
Lydia’s heart sank as she entered the smart hotel, the large Christmas tree mocking her as it sparkled. With Christmas a week away, carols filled the hotel with joy and happiness. She was far from feeling anything like that, knowing this meeting with Raul would be so much more difficult than that first one almost three weeks ago. She hung up her coat in the cloakroom and walked over to the mirror, where, feeling the need for more armour, she reapplied her lipstick then looked at her reflection.
She’d changed in the last three weeks. She might not look any different from the woman who had first met Raul, but she was. She’d had her heart broken—exactly what she’d spent all her adult life trying to avoid. Now, thanks to her father’s bad business dealings and one impulsive weekend with Raul Valdez, she felt totally out of control even though she looked far from it. She took in a deep breath and smoothed her hands down the bold red skirt of the suit she’d spent time selecting this morning. Just as she had done on their first meeting, she’d dressed with care, wanting to exude a confidence she was far from feeling, and now she’d seen the headlines in today’s papers she needed every bit of help she could get.
Had Raul seen them too?
He couldn’t have seen it. He’d never have calmly left a message to meet her just to sign papers if he had. Would he?
He is capable of anything.
That thought echoed round in her mind as her heels tapped out a solitary beat across the elegant lobby towards the restaurant where Raul would soon meet his brother. The fact that he’d arranged to meet her so close to that meeting must surely mean all he wanted was a few papers signed. She clung to that hope as she entered the restaurant, strangely empty of any other dinners. When she saw him sitting calmly waiting for her at a table in the middle of the room, she knew that was a mistaken idea. He was dressed immaculately in a charcoal-grey suit, but nothing could detract from the air of superiority and total control he exuded.
He rose from his seat and stood waiting for her; the angry set of his handsome face left her in no doubt he had seen the headlines. Her futile hope slithered away, taking with it the remainder of her confidence as his dark eyes glared accusingly at her, his anger palpable even at this distance.
She walked towards him, her head held high, trying to match his strength, to show he didn’t intimidate her at all. As she got closer her confidence faltered and she stopped halfway across the room, glad now that they were the only people there. She glanced around, just to check.
‘I booked the entire restaurant to ensure I had the privacy I needed.’ Raul sounded calm, approachable, but she wasn’t fooled. She could detect the steely edge lurking beneath the surface. Calm he might be, but he was definitely far from approachable.
She turned to face him, looking into those dark eyes she’d lost her heart to, trying to bring confidence from deep within her. ‘I got your message.’
‘And I have seen your salacious kiss and tell in the papers this morning.’ He went straight in for the kill, his voice now harder than the gleam of anger in his eyes, but she remained resolutely still, meeting his gaze and the accusation within it head-on. Inside she trembled but outside she was strong and defiant. The armour that had served her well for many years deflected most of the pain.
‘I’m very sorry to disappoint, but I am not the source of your embarrassment.’ She raised her brows at him in a show of high-handedness as she said that final word, then continued before he had a chance to say anything, ‘Surely a man like you is used to sidestepping such stories in the papers.’
‘About my lovers, yes.’ He let the barbed words hang in the air and she refused to react, refused to think that one day she too could be linked to him as one of his lovers—exactly what she’d never wanted to be. ‘About my fiancée, no.’
Fury boiled up inside her. ‘I am not your fiancée. Not any longer. I kept my side of the deal.’
‘On that I beg to differ.’ The superiority in his voice rankled but she maintained a stony silence, forcing him to continue. ‘You have shared the story of my half-brother with someone and now it is everywhere. You broke the terms of our contract, Lydia.’
‘I have not shared it with anyone,’ she blurted out, hurt that he could accuse her of such a thing after all they’d shared.
Raul laughed. A cold, cynical laugh, which sent a shiver of worry all over her,
