say I’d trust my own flesh and blood over a conniving gold-digger any day of the week.’
Heated colour came back into Trinity’s cheeks. She looked at him, big blue eyes beseeching him with commendable authenticity.
‘I’m not a gold-digger. You don’t understand. Everything you’re saying is all wrong—my marriage with Rio is not what you—’
‘There you are, darling. I’ve been looking for you. Charlotte Lacey wants to talk to you about next week’s charity function.’
Cruz blanched. He hadn’t even noticed Rio joining them. He’d been consumed with the woman in front of him, whose arm was now being taken firmly in her husband’s hand. Rio’s dark brown eyes met Cruz’s over Trinity’s head. They were hard. Trinity had gone even paler, if that was possible.
‘If you don’t mind, brother, I need to steal my wife away.’
Cruz could see it in Rio’s eyes then—a familiar resentment. And shame and anger. Futility choked him. There was nothing he could do. He knew Rio would already be despising the fact that he’d allowed Cruz to see him brought so low at this woman’s greedy hands.
He watched as they walked back into the crowd, and it wasn’t long before they left for the evening—without saying goodbye. Rio might have shown Cruz a chink of vulnerability by revealing his financial problems, but if anything that only demonstrated how much Trinity had got to him—because he’d never before allowed his brother to see a moment’s weakness. Cruz’s sense that his determination to see Rio treated fairly had been futile rose up again—he had never truly bridged the gap between them.
Cruz stood at the window in his drawing room and watched his brother handing Trinity into the passenger seat of a dark Jeep in the forecourt outside the house, before he got into the driver’s seat himself.
He felt grim. All he could do now was be there to pick up the pieces of Rio’s financial meltdown and do his best to ensure that Rio got a chance to start again—and that his wife didn’t get her grasping hands on another cent.
At the last second, as if hearing his thoughts, Trinity turned her head to look at Cruz through the ground-floor window. For a fleeting moment their eyes met, and he could have sworn he saw hers shimmer with moisture, even from this distance.
He told himself they had to be tears of anger now that she knew she’d been found out. She was trapped in a situation of her own making. It should have filled Cruz with a sense of satisfaction, but instead all he felt was a heavy weight in his chest.
Rio’s Jeep took off with a spurt of gravel.
Cruz didn’t realise it then, but it would be the last time he saw his brother alive.
Three months later. Solicitor’s office.
TRINITY’S HEART STOPPED and her mouth dried. ‘Mr De Carrillo is joining us?’
The solicitor glanced at her distractedly, looking for a paper on his overcrowded desktop. ‘Yes—he is the executor of his brother’s will, and we are in his building,’ he pointed out redundantly.
She’d been acutely aware that she was in the impressive De Carrillo building in London’s bustling financial zone, but it hadn’t actually occurred to her that Cruz himself would be here.
To her shame, her first instinct was to check her appearance—which of course she couldn’t do, but she was glad of the choice of clothing she’d made: dark loose trousers and a grey silk shirt. She’d tied her long hair back in a braid, as much out of habit when dealing with small energetic boys than for any other reason. She hadn’t put on any make-up and regretted that now, fearing she must look about eighteen.
Just then there was a light knock on the door and it opened. She heard Mr Drew’s assistant saying in a suspiciously breathless and awestruck voice, ‘Mr De Carrillo, sir.’
The solicitor stood up, immediately obsequious, greeting Cruz De Carrillo effusively and leading him to a seat beside Trinity’s on the other side of his desk.
Every nerve came to immediate and tingling life. The tiny hairs on her arms stood up, quivering. She lamented her uncontrollable reaction—would she ever not react to him?
She sensed him come to stand near her, tall and effortlessly intimidating. Childishly, she wanted to avoid looking at him. His scent was a tantalising mix of musk and something earthy and masculine. It was his scent now that sent her hurtling back to that cataclysmic evening in his house three months ago, when she’d realised just how badly Rio had betrayed her.
The shock of knowing that Rio obviously hadn’t told him the truth about their marriage was still palpable, even now. And the fact that Cruz had so readily believed the worst of her hurt far worse than it should.
It had hurt almost as much as when he’d looked at her with dawning horror and self-disgust after kissing her to within an inch of her life. It was an experience still seared onto her brain, so deeply embedded inside her that she sometimes woke from X-rated dreams, tangled amongst her sheets and sweating. Almost two years later it was beyond humiliating.
Trinity dragged her mind away from that disturbing labyrinth of memories. She had more important things to deal with now. Because three months ago, while she and Rio had been driving home from Cruz’s house, they’d been involved in a car crash and Rio had tragically died.
Since that day she’d become lone step-parent to Mateo and Sancho, Rio’s two-and-a-half-year-old twins. Miraculously, she’d escaped from the accident with only cuts and bruises and a badly sprained ankle. She had no memory of the actual accident—only recalled waking in the hospital feeling battered all over and learning of her husband’s death from a grim and ashen-faced Cruz.
Gathering her composure, she stood up to face him, steeling herself against his effect. Which was useless. As soon as she looked at him it was like a blow to her solar plexus.
She’d seen him since the night of the accident—at the funeral, of course, and then when he’d called at the house for brief perfunctory visits to check that she and his nephews had everything they needed. He hadn’t engaged with her beyond that. Her skin prickled now with foreboding. She had a sense that he’d merely been biding his time.
She forced herself to say, as calmly as she could, ‘Cruz.’
‘Trinity.’
His voice reverberated deep inside her, even as he oozed his habitual icy control.
The solicitor had gone back around his desk and said now, ‘Espresso, wasn’t it, Mr De Carrillo?’
Trinity blinked and looked to see the older gentleman holding out a small cup and saucer. Instinctively, because she was closer and because it was good manners, she reached for it to hand it to Cruz, only belatedly realising that her hand was trembling.
She prayed he wouldn’t notice the tremor as she held out the delicate china to him. His hand was masculine and square. Strong. Long fingers...short, functional nails. At that moment she had a flash of remembering how his hand had felt between her legs, stroking her intimately...
Just before he took
