Книга - Rafael’s Love-Child

Rafael's Love-Child
Kate Walker


When Serena wakes up in hospital with amnesia, her only visitors are Rafael Cordoba and his baby son, Tonio. Following doctor's orders, Rafael tells her nothing except she had her accident in his car, but he doesn't know her.Rafael insists Serena recuperate at his home and, already having strong feelings for the sexy Spaniard, and adoring his son, she accepts. But what is Rafael not telling her, and where is his baby's mother?









“I’ve brought someone with me,” Rafael told her, as he lifted something up and deposited it on the bed.


Totally bemused, Serena realized that she was staring at a carrycot, and inside, dressed in soft blue cotton, tiny feet bare, lay a small baby.

“Oh! He’s gorgeous!” she exclaimed. “What’s his name?”

“I call him Tonio.”

“He’s yours? I didn’t know you were married.”

“I’m not.”

“Then Tonio…. He’s a—a—love-child?”

“A love-child?” Rafael’s mouth twisted cynically on the word. “There are those who would call him something far less complimentary.”

“But if you and his mother are together….”

“No!” It came out forcefully. “Tonio’s mother and I are not together.”









He’s a man of cool sophistication.

He’s got pride, power and wealth.

At the top of his corporate ladder, he’s a ruthless businessman—an expert lover

His life runs like a well-oiled machine….

Until now.

Because suddenly he’s responsible for a BABY!

His Baby

A miniseries from Harlequin Presents


.

He’s sexy, successful…and he’s facing up to fatherhood!

There’ll be another HIS BABY title out soon.




Rafael’s Love-Child

Kate Walker








For Doctor Cathy

With thanks for all the information and advice




CONTENTS


CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN




CHAPTER ONE


‘DO YOU know who you are?’

The question came sharply, making Serena blink in confusion as she struggled to focus on her surroundings. Her mind seemed clogged and hazy, her thoughts strangely fuzzy round the edges.

‘What a silly question—of course I know who I am! My name is Serena Martin. And…’

Frowning slightly, brown eyes narrowed in concentration, she ran a disturbed hand through the bright auburn of her hair as she looked round her, taking in the pastel-toned room, the soft peach and cream curtains that matched the cover on the bed in which she lay. In spite of obvious attempts to make it look attractive, the bedroom still had an impersonal, institutional feel. And the dark-haired woman who sat beside her bed, her grey eyes fixed on Serena’s face, wore a tailored white coat that told its own story.

‘…and I presume this is a hospital of some kind?’

‘That’s right.’

‘And do you know what happened?’

Two voices sounded this time, chiming together so that it was almost impossible to tell them apart. But it was enough to make Serena realise that that the woman in the white coat—the doctor—was the one who had reassured her, not the one asking all the questions.

They were coming from the man on the opposite side of the room. The man whose powerful frame filled the doorway in which he stood, strong back ramrod-straight, broad shoulders squared.

He was tall, dark, definitely imposing—frighteningly so.

Frighteningly? The word brought Serena up sharp. She was sure she had never seen this man in her life before, so where had that description come from? She couldn’t say, only knew that it seemed disturbingly appropriate.

‘Do you?’ he insisted now, the intriguing accent that she had caught so briefly a moment before deepening with the emphasis of his tone. ‘Can you tell me how you came to be here?’

That was much more difficult. If she hunted in her mind for the answer to his question, all she found was confusion, tangled, clouded thoughts and vague memories. There were muddled impressions of noise and panic, a sickening crash and someone screaming in fear.

Was that someone herself?

‘I—I presume there must have been some sort of accident.’

‘What kind of accident?’

For all that he hadn’t moved from his position at the door, the way that the man spoke made Serena feel as if he had actually stepped further into the room, coming dangerously close to her and seeming to pin her against the wall.

‘I—I don’t know!’ For the first time she faced him head-on, turning defiant brown eyes on his dark face. ‘Why don’t you tell me?’

Who was he? Another doctor? He wasn’t wearing the regulation white coat that revealed the occupation of the woman who still sat at her bedside. Instead, his lean frame was encased in the sort of dark suit whose exquisite fabric and perfect tailoring screamed the sort of perfection only a great deal of money could buy.

But perhaps he was of some higher rank than the friendly woman—a surgeon, or a consultant. Wasn’t it the case that they didn’t wear white coats, just as they were addressed as ‘Mr’ and not ‘Doctor’?

Whoever he was, he was stunning, impossibly handsome. Looking at him was like looking into the brightness of the sun, the effect on every one of her senses was so devastating.

That impressive height was combined with jet-black hair, sleek and heavy, brushed back from his face in a way that emphasised his superbly carved cheekbones. Dazedly Serena became aware of a straight, jutting nose, determined chin and surprisingly sensual mouth, but it was the eyes that she noticed most. Fringed by impossibly thick, luxuriantly black lashes, they were deep gold, almost the colour of flame and blazing just as brightly.

And the rich tan that bronzed this man’s skin was not the result of some two-week Mediterranean holiday. Instead it was obviously his natural colouring, the year-round tone that came from an ancestry that was definitely not English.

Unconsciously, Serena shifted slightly in the bed, feeling suddenly too warm, too restless to stay still. There was a new, pagan wildness in her blood, one that drove her heart faster, pushing hot colour into her cheeks, making her sharply aware of the fact that under the bedclothes she was only wearing a short, regulation hospital nightdress.

And the truly disturbing thing was that she could see her own feelings reflected in this man’s eyes, in the black, enlarged pupils, the intensity of his gaze, even though his expression never altered but stayed as coolly assessing as before. The contrast between that apparently calm control and the blaze of something very different and very primitive in his gaze dried her mouth and throat so that she had to swallow hard to relieve them.

‘What makes you think I can tell you anything?’ he flung at her now, his accent deepening on the words in a way that confirmed her suspicions about his ancestry.

‘Mr Cordoba…’ the doctor put in quietly, warningly, but both Serena and her inquisitor ignored the interjection, their attention focused solely on each other.

‘Well, I presume I’m supposed to know you.’

‘Not at all!’

An arrogant little flick of his long-fingered hand dismissed her comment as nonsense.

‘On the contrary, you have never seen me before in your life.’

Well, that was a relief. She was sure that if she had come up against this man at any time in her past she would remember him—with bells on! She didn’t know how she had come to be here, in this hospital, had no idea what had happened to her, but she definitely felt easier knowing that this—what had the doctor called him?—this Mr Cordoba had played no part in her life before.

‘Then who are you?’

‘My name is Rafael Cordoba.’

Clearly he expected that that would mean something to her. Serena could only wish that it did. Right now she would be grateful for anything that would explain this Rafael Cordoba’s presence in her room. Anything to get him off her back, stop this unnerving string of questions.

No, if she was honest, what she really wanted was to be free of this restless, unsettled feeling that he created in her. Never before had she felt so intensely physically aware of anyone, and the decidedly carnal nature of the thoughts he sparked off in her brain was making it so very difficult to concentrate on anything else.

‘And you…?’ Serena turned to the woman at her bedside, a friendly, sympathetic face in the middle of this confusion and uncertainty.

‘I’m Dr Greene.’ To her relief the other woman stepped into the breach, answering the mute appeal of her patient’s deep brown eyes. ‘Do you feel up to answering some questions?’

‘I’ll try.’

It was a struggle to ignore Cordoba. Even though she forced herself to concentrate on the doctor, she could still see him out of the corner of her eye. His presence in the doorway was like a bruise at the back of her mind, dark and ominous.

‘Your name is Serena Martin?’

‘That’s right.’

‘And you are how old?’

‘Twenty-three.’

Slowly Serena started to relax. This was easier. Dr Greene’s quiet questions posed no problems, carried no threats. And the confusion in her thoughts that had so disturbed her at first was gradually starting to clear. She couldn’t have suffered any real ill-effects if her answers came as quickly and easily as this.

‘Can you tell me your address?’

‘Thirty-five Alban Road, Ryeton… What is it?’ Serena questioned sharply as the pen which had been writing busily suddenly stopped and the doctor turned surprised eyes on her face.

‘Ryeton in Yorkshire?’

‘Yes.’

‘Then what are you doing in London?’

It was that voice again. The one with the accent that lifted all the little hairs at the back of her neck, sent shivers skittering down her spine. She should have known that Cordoba couldn’t bring himself to stay quiet for long.

‘L-London? I—is that where we are?’

‘Where this hospital is,’ he put in curtly, ignoring the reproving glance Dr Greene turned in his direction. ‘Where you are, where the accident took place, where—’

‘That’s enough, Mr Cordoba!’

But Rafael Cordoba was clearly not at all concerned by the doctor’s intervention, his dark head coming up arrogantly, golden eyes flashing rejection of her reproof as he took a couple of swift, forceful strides into the room.

‘So what were you doing here, if you live in—?’

‘I don’t know!’ Serena had reached the end of her tether. Her head was aching and she felt exhausted, wrung out, as if she had just run a marathon. Frantically she shook her head, tears of weakness filling her eyes, blurring the sight of his darkly intent face. ‘Perhaps I’m on holiday. Perhaps…’

‘I said enough!’ Dr Greene was clearly not in any way over-awed or cowed. But then she continued on a softer, more conciliatory note, one that revealed she was far from under-impressed by this man’s forceful presence, ‘I have my patient to think of. Miss Martin is easily tired. She has been through something of an ordeal, the sort of thing that would set anyone back, let alone someone who was already rather rundown. She needs rest, and I must insist that she gets it.’

And that was obviously not what he wanted to hear, Serena thought hazily as she saw the flare of anger in those amazing eyes, the temper that fought against the strict control he imposed on it so that the beautiful mouth clamped into an uncompromisingly hard line.

In that moment it was as if she had known him for ever, so recognisable were the danger signs in his face. Whoever he was, he certainly wasn’t accustomed to being opposed by someone he obviously considered his inferior. His breath hissed in through his teeth as he prepared to speak.

But then, just as she had nerved herself for the explosion that she felt sure was about to break over the doctor’s unsuspecting head, he clearly reconsidered his position. That forceful jaw snapped shut on the angry words he had been about to utter, closing with such force that Serena actually heard the click of his teeth as they came together.

‘As you wish!’ he declared icily.

Satisfied that he was going to keep silent, at least for the moment, Dr Greene turned back to Serena.

‘Is there anyone we can contact for you? Your parents? Some other next of kin?’

‘No.’ Despondently she shook her head. ‘My parents are no longer alive. My mother died of cancer last year and my father had a fatal heart attack eighteen months before that. There’s no one.’

Once more she had to struggle against the sting of tears, blinking furiously to hold them back as the doctor leaned forward and placed a reassuring hand on hers.

‘You really must not get upset. You need to rest and take things quietly, recuperate…’

‘But how can I rest until I know what happened?’ Serena’s voice quavered weakly on the words. How could anyone expect her to relax until she had been told exactly how she had come to be here, in this hospital, and just what had happened before that?

Because she could remember nothing of what must have been an accident that had so knocked her for six that she hadn’t even been aware of having been brought to the hospital and put in this bed. And if she was in London…

‘Please!’ Reaching out, she caught hold of the doctor’s hand, clinging onto it as if it was her only lifeline, the one weak link with sanity in a world that suddenly seemed to have gone completely mad. ‘You must tell me! How did I come to be here?’

‘You had an accident.’ Dr Greene spoke with obvious reluctance. ‘You were in a car crash and you had a rather nasty bang on the head. You’ve been completely out of it for a while.’

‘A while? How long is a while?’

‘It’s almost ten days now. You were deeply unconscious at first, but just lately you’ve been drifting in and out.’

‘I have?’

Frowning hard, Serena forced herself to concentrate. If she really tried, it was just possible to recall vague moments that she had thought she had dreamed. Moments of seeming to struggle to the surface of some clouded, murky pond, reaching frantically for footholds or something to cling on to.

Then, just for a few tiny, brief seconds, she had been able to open her eyes and look around, barely managing to focus before the heavy, sticky darkness had descended once more and folded around her, cutting her off again.

‘There was someone…’

Someone had been sitting by the bed, watching and waiting for her to wake. Someone who had heard the unhappy, troubled sounds she had made as she stirred restively, struggling against the nightmares that enclosed her. Someone who had smoothed the tangled copper hair back from her hot forehead with a cool, soothing hand.

And, later, someone who had poured her water and held her as she struggled to drink, gently dissuading her from gulping as she strained to ease her parched and aching throat.

‘Someone was here…’

‘A nurse. You’ve been under strict observation.’

‘No…’

It hadn’t been a nurse. She had no idea how she knew that, but it was the one point on which she was absolutely positive. The good Samaritan, the soft voiced helper who had tended to her in the darkness of the night, at her lowest moments, had not had the coolly professional approach, the detached, impersonal restraint of a trained carer. And the voice she had heard…

The voice!

Wide and rounded with shock, her brown eyes flew to Rafael Cordoba’s face, clashing harshly with the stony golden gaze he turned on her. The beautifully carved features could have been sculpted from bronze marble, showing no response at all as he deliberately blanked out her questioning glance, stonewalling, giving away nothing at all.

‘You have had the best care that money could buy, Miss Martin,’ he said coolly, as if that was the unspoken question she had asked him.

But she didn’t really need to ask anything. She knew what she had heard, and she had heard that accent soothing her, comforting her in the darkness of the night. So why had he now turned from ministering angel into Spanish Inquisitor?

‘But…’ she began, then wearily shook her aching head. ‘I need to know…’

Her voice seemed beyond her control, fading weakly into a sigh she could not suppress.

‘You’re tired,’ Dr Greene put in gently. ‘You must be careful not to overdo things at this early stage. You know as much as you can cope with right now. You need to rest.’

Wearily Serena nodded. She was tired. Her thoughts were sliding out of focus, that fuddled, heavy feeling like cotton wool back inside her head. Lacking the strength to stay upright, she sank back against her pillows, heavy eyelids drooping.

‘I’ll be back to talk to you again soon. Everything will be all right.’

‘Everything!’ It was a harsh exclamation, slashing into the silence that had descended as Rafael moved suddenly, one hand coming up in a violent gesture. ‘Everything! Madre de Dios, what about—?’

‘Mr Cordoba!’ There was real annoyance in the doctor’s voice now. ‘I said enough! I want you to go now—to leave Miss Martin alone.’

He was tempted to rebel against her instructions, it was obvious. Once more that dangerous anger flared in his eyes, in the darkly searing glance he flung at the doctor and then, unnervingly, at Serena herself. But a couple of seconds later he drew himself up again, that strong jaw setting determinedly.

‘Very well,’ he said, each word cold and clipped and icily precise, heightening his accent strongly. ‘I’ll go. But…’

The turn of his head, the direction of his eyes, made it plain that the next thing he said was for Serena alone.

‘I’ll be back,’ he said, low and hard, and deadly. ‘I promise you that. I’ll be back just as soon as I can.’

They were only words, Serena tried to tell herself as she shrank back in the bed, pulling the covers up close around her. Only words. Almost the same ones that the doctor had used just a few moments before.

But she had seen Rafael Cordoba’s eyes as he spoke, seen the dangerous gleam in them, the burn of something that made her shiver inwardly, and as a result his promise to return had had precisely the opposite effect to the reassurance that Dr Greene had given her.

He would be back; she could have no doubt about that. And the honest truth was that the prospect of coming face to face with him again was one that made her shudder in fearful apprehension.




CHAPTER TWO


‘I’VE brought someone to see you.’

‘What?’

Serena glanced up from the magazine she had been staring at listlessly, not taking in a single word, her eyes going to where the man who had spoken stood in the doorway.

Rafael Cordoba, of course. Who else would it be?

It was five days now since the disturbing, confusing moment when she had woken from unconsciousness to find herself here in this hospital and on the receiving end of Rafael’s forceful questioning. ‘I’ll be back,’ he had promised, and he had kept firmly to that promise. The very next morning he had appeared at her bedside, and every day since.

But it was obvious that Dr Greene or someone in a position of even higher authority had had a word or two with him before he had been let into the ward. The hard, aggressive tone had been muted, the curt, sharp questions silenced, temporarily at least, and even the powerful sexual awareness she had sensed in him had been ruthlessly reined in.

‘I’m sorry—what did you say?’

She prayed that he would take the unevenness in her voice, the faint quaver she couldn’t quite suppress, as the result of being taken by surprise by his unexpected arrival. The last thing she wanted him to suspect was the sheer, mind-blowing, physical effect he had on her simply by existing. Just the sight of that long, lean body, the jet-black hair and burning golden eyes made her breath catch in her throat, her heart stumbling in its natural rhythm.

And today it was even worse. On every other occasion on which she had seen him, he had been dressed in an immaculately cut suit like the one he had been wearing on that first day. But today, perhaps as a concession to the heat of the sun outside, he had thrown off that formality, opting instead for casual jeans and a short-sleeved shirt.

The tight denim hugged the firm lines of his narrow waist and hips, emphasising his masculinity in a way that was sinfully sensual, and the pure white cotton of his shirt contrasted starkly with the bronzed skin at his arms and throat, making it seem darker and warmer as a result.

Nervously Serena twitched at the peach-coloured cover on her bed, painfully aware of the amount of pale, lightly freckled skin exposed by the sleeveless vee-necked top of her cream cotton nightdress. She longed to cover up, but feared that any unwise movement would simply draw his attention to the way she was feeling.

‘I’ve brought someone with me…’

‘Another visitor? That’s a surprise. I didn’t think I knew anyone in London.’

Her memory of the accident, and the days leading up to it, had still not returned, and in a way that she found intensely frustrating neither the doctor nor Rafael was prepared to give her any information on the subject.

‘You have to be patient,’ was the response she heard every time she asked a question or fretted at her lack of recollection. ‘It’s better to let your memory come back naturally, on its own. If you’re told anything at all, then that won’t happen.’

‘So where is this friend of yours?’

‘Right here…’ Rafael told her, bronzed forearms tensing as he lifted something up and deposited it on the bed.

Totally bemused, Serena realised that she was staring at a carrycot, and inside, dressed in soft blue cotton, tiny feet bare, lay a small baby.

‘Oh! He’s gorgeous!’ she exclaimed, her full mouth breaking into a smile of delight. Automatically she leaned forward, wanting to pick him up, then froze, unsure of what Rafael’s response might be.

‘You think so?’

Rafael’s reaction was not at all what she had expected. There was a new and disturbing tension in his tone, one that jarred sharply, scraping over Serena’s nerves and setting them sharply on edge.

‘Of course I do! Wouldn’t anyone…?’

Her words faded as, alerted by the sound of her voice, the baby stirred suddenly. His legs kicked sharply, small fists waving in the air, and his closed lids lifted, wide dark eyes looking directly into hers. Her breath suddenly caught in her throat as she felt an involuntary kick of response.

‘What’s his name?’ she managed on a dry, painful croak.

A faint thatch of fine black hair fuzzed the baby’s scalp. The black hair and something about the shape of the child’s face reminded her strongly of the man beside her. The man whose image had haunted her thoughts by day, disturbed her sleep at night in heated, shockingly erotic dreams that she had woken from to find her heart still racing, her hair damp with sweat.

‘His full name is Antonio Felipe Martinez Cordoba.’

Cordoba. There it was. The confirmation she had been dreading. How had this happened to her? How could this man, whom she had known for only a few days, have such an effect on her that it mattered so much to think that he might already be in a relationship? That he had fathered a child with another woman.

‘What a mouthful.’

She concentrated her attention on the baby as she spoke, putting out a tentative finger to stroke one waving hand, a smile escaping her as she saw the way his little fist closed round it, clutching hard. And in that moment it was as if the little boy’s hand had curled around her heart as well, taking it prisoner as it was flooded with an unexpected and totally overwhelming rush of love for this small, vulnerable being.

‘A big name for such a little scrap.’

‘I call him Tonio.’

‘That suits him.’ She bent forward, smiling into the child’s wide eyes, the red-gold curtain of her hair falling round her oval face, forming a shield from Rafael’s watchful gaze. ‘He’s yours?’

His wordless murmur went unheeded as her thoughts leapt on to the next logical connection.

‘I didn’t know you were married.’

‘I’m not.’ His unexpected response brought her head round in a rush, brown eyes widening in shock. ‘Never have been, even though I came close to it once.’

‘Then Tonio. He’s a—a—love-child?’

Her heart was doing crazy things inside her chest: beating way too fast and twisting, practically turning somersaults, so that she was unable to breathe. Not married didn’t mean not committed, and after all what greater commitment was there between two people than the fact that they had a child together?

‘A love-child?’ Rafael’s beautifully shaped mouth twisted cynically on the word. ‘There are those who would call him something far less complimentary.’

‘But if you and his mother are together…’

‘No!’ It came forcefully, almost violently, and those brilliant golden eyes blazed with fierce rejection of her statement. ‘Tonio’s mother and I are not, as you so tactfully put it, “together”.’

Serena’s heart, which had started to slow down, to return to its natural rhythm, lurched painfully at the sudden change in his tone.

Somehow, without quite knowing how, she had overstepped whatever careful lines he drew around his personal life. The man she had grown accustomed to over the past few days had vanished and the person she had privately nicknamed the Spanish Inquisitor, the man who had so upset and frightened her at their first meeting, was back.

‘I—I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to pry.’

Thoroughly unnerved, she snatched her hand away from the baby’s grasp, suddenly afraid to show her response to the child.

‘I never…’

But she got no further. Furious at having his new-found toy so abruptly snatched from him, Tonio murmured a faint protest which then developed into a full-blooded howl, his little face screwing into a furious grimace, his cheeks flushed bright red.

‘Oh, sweetheart, I’m sorry!’ Serena’s remorse was immediate, her fear of Tonio’s father forgotten as she moved hastily to comfort the little boy.

Rafael was there before her, scooping the child out of his carrycot and gathering him close.

‘Hush, mi corazón, hush,’ he soothed huskily. ‘All is well; you’re safe.’

Serena’s heart tightened again, her nerves tying themselves into hard, painful knots at the sight of the baby held so firmly against the strength and width of the hard wall of the man’s chest. His small, vulnerable form seemed so much tinier, so delicate when contrasted with the arms that enclosed him, the long-fingered hand that curved lovingly around the delicate skull, supporting the tiny head.

Immediately all the loneliness and apprehension that had gripped her just before Rafael’s arrival flooded back with a vengeance.

This was why, in spite of her initial fear of him, she had been so glad to see Rafael when he had appeared in her room on the second day after she had regained consciousness. No one else was likely to visit. There was no one she could turn to who could help her obtain the small necessities that would make her stay in hospital that bit more comfortable.

And Rafael hadn’t needed to be asked. In fact he had arrived that first day with flowers, fruit, and a bag containing a selection of toiletries, all of the most luxurious brands, more expensive than anything she had ever been able to provide for herself. He had even thought to bring a couple of new nightdresses, guessing at her size with an accuracy that had frankly astonished and unnerved her. It spoke of an intimate knowledge of the female body that she found she didn’t want to enquire into too closely.

‘Keep them!’ he had declared dismissively when she had protested at his generosity. ‘They’re only trifles—I can easily afford them.’

But just that morning she had learned that the nightdresses and toiletries were only part of it, that his generosity went much further than she had ever imagined. And that was something she could not let go unchallenged.

‘Is it true that you have been paying all my bills?’

Rafael’s proud head came up sharply, black brows drawing together over the tawny eyes that were suddenly wary, as if he had something he very definitely wanted to conceal.

‘Who told you that?’ he demanded in a voice that promised retribution on the person responsible just as soon as he found out.

‘Oh, come on, Mr Cordoba!’ Serena protested. ‘I may have had an accident—a knock on the head—but I’ve not completely lost my mind!’

‘I thought we agreed on Rafael,’ he inserted coolly, in an obvious attempt to distract her from her line of questioning.

‘We agreed on nothing! You instructed me to use your name, told me not to worry my pretty little head about anything…’

And, weak and vulnerable, she had done just that. She had accepted his presence in the hospital because the medical staff did, hadn’t persisted with the questions that had been so subtly but effectively blocked because with her head still aching and her thoughts still whirling in confusion it was easier not to. She had simply assumed that Rafael Cordoba had some part in the time she couldn’t remember, the moments just before or just after the accident, and so hadn’t pressed the matter.

But not now. Now she couldn’t believe that she had been so foolish, so blindly, stupidly naïve. Now she wanted some answers.

‘And it wasn’t just a bang on the head,’ Rafael continued imperturbably, moving to lay the baby back in his carrycot. ‘You were very much out of it there for a while, and you were lucky to get away with only the injuries you had.’

‘You don’t have to tell me that!’ Serena retorted swiftly.

She still felt cold inside just to recall the moment when, helped by a nurse, she had first managed to struggle out of her hospital regulation gown and into one of the new, pretty cotton ones Rafael had provided for her. She had been shocked and horrified to see the bruising that covered so much of her body, the scratches and cuts that marred the whiteness of her skin.

And that bruising had been on her face as well, when she had finally nerved herself to look in a mirror. Patched and ugly, in shades that blended from dark purple to a nasty, fading yellow, it had mottled her forehead and all down the right side of her cheek. It was the darkest, most obviously damaged area, just above her eye, that had made her shudder to think just how lightly she had escaped and what might have happened.

‘But I’m feeling better now, and I’m able to think straight again. For a start, I’m in a private ward. And I’d have to be all sorts of a fool to think that the food I’m getting, the nursing care, the comfort that’s been provided is the same as I’d be getting if I had just been taken in as ordinary Serena Martin, brought in unconscious off the street, with no one to help her. So I asked a few questions…’

That didn’t please him at all. It was stamped all over his autocratic face, etched into every arrogant line of bone and muscle. And the way his sensual mouth tightened, obviously clamping down on some angry response, dried her throat uncomfortably so that she had to force herself to continue.

‘I was told that I was receiving private medical care, and that you were footing the bill. Is this true?’

For the space of several taut and uncomfortable seconds, it looked as if he wasn’t going to answer her. But then a disdainfully curt nod of his dark head admitted the truth.

‘But why? Why should you, a complete stranger, do all this for me? That is, if you are the stranger you said you were.’

‘And why the devil would I lie to you?’

Scorn blazed in his eyes, searing over her skin until she felt as if it had scoured off a much-needed protective layer. Instinctively she folded her arms around herself, suddenly feeling over-exposed.

Temporarily she had managed to blot out the fact that she was actually in a bedroom, however institutionalised, in her nightclothes, while this darkly devastating man was fully dressed beside her. But that look had ripped away the shield she had built around her.

‘I—I don’t know. I can’t even begin to imagine. You say I’d never met you before, and yet you do so much for me.’

‘I told you I could afford it.’

‘I know what you told me!’

Serena flung out her arms in a wild gesture of rejection of his response, heedless of the way it made the slightly too large neckline of her nightdress gape, revealing the rich curves of her breasts.

‘It’s what you’re not saying that’s bothering me! I don’t need to know that you’re some wildly rich international banker or that the cost of my stay here is just chickenfeed to someone with your millions. I want to know exactly why you’re involved in all this—and don’t you dare say, All what?’ she flung at him as he drew breath sharply, prior, she was sure, to doing just that.

In his turn, Rafael lifted his own hands in a gesture that surprised her by its apparent mood of concession. But the wry twist to his mouth, the distinct glint in his eyes, spoke of something else entirely.

‘You are obviously feeling much better,’ he murmured dryly. ‘But the doctor believes…’

‘Yes, I know that the doctor believes it’s better to wait. That she wants me to remember on my own. But I’m not remembering, and it’s doing my head in… It’s making me feel worse, even more confused,’ she amended hastily as he frowned his confusion, even his near-perfect grasp of English incapable of following the slang phrase. ‘I feel like I’m going out of my mind. I’m frightened—’

Her voice broke unevenly on the last word, hot tears burning in her eyes, making them glisten brilliantly as she struggled to blink them back.

‘Right now you seem like the only person I know in the entire world, but I don’t really know you! I don’t know a thing about you except the way you seem to have moved in here, taking over…’

‘Maldito sea! I felt responsible.’

It was the last thing she had expected and it stopped her dead, her eyes wide and stunned, her soft mouth actually falling open a little in shock.

‘You? Responsible? But how?’

The look he turned on her made her stomach quail nauseously. Suddenly she wished she’d never opened her big mouth.

‘It was my car.’

‘Your…’

Through the tumult of emotion inside her head she couldn’t begin to interpret the inflexion he put on the words, the feeling behind them. But she couldn’t stop herself from reacting purely instinctively, recoiling back against the pillow, all colour leaching from her face, one hand coming up to cover her trembling mouth.

‘You—you were driving?’

‘Dios, no! I wasn’t even in England at the time, but my—’ He caught himself up sharply, seeming to hunt for the right words. ‘It was my car that was involved in the accident.’

‘Your car…’ Slowly Serena lowered her protective hand, sitting back up a little, but her face was still clouded with confusion. ‘Was I driving?’

‘No. You were a passenger.’ It was curt to the point of rudeness, obviously deeply reluctant.

‘Then what…? How…?’

‘Miss Martin…’ Rafael used cold formality to freeze her out, stop her questioning in its tracks. ‘May I remind you that I have been instructed not to give you the full facts about your accident? Doctor’s orders, I believe you say.’

But now she was really worried. Being left to remember in her own time was one thing. This dreadful feeling that something was being kept from her because it would be too upsetting to know it quite another.

‘But why? Did something awful happen? Who was the driver? Where is he—she—now?’

‘Miss Martin—Serena…’

‘Rafael!’ It was wrenched from her, her state of mind too disturbed to notice the way she had used his Christian name as she lurched forward, half out of the bed, to grab hold of his hand and clutch at it hard. ‘Please!’

For the space of perhaps two dozen long drawn-out, heart-thudding seconds he hesitated, obviously thinking hard. With his hooded eyes looking down into her own darkly shadowed ones, she saw him come to a decision, change his mind, rethink and change it again.

‘Please!’ she repeated, knowing intuitively that he had decided against her. ‘I need to know.’

His sigh was a blend of exasperation and unwilling resignation.

‘Serena—’ he said at last. ‘The driver…he did not survive the crash.’

‘Oh, no!’

It was the worst she had imagined. The only thing that really explained his reluctance to speak. No, perhaps the worst thing was the way she was feeling—or rather not feeling. She couldn’t even remember who had been driving the car, so she didn’t know what she should be feeling.

‘Who was he? Did I know him?’

But Rafael’s face had closed up, heavy lids and long, luxuriant lashes hiding his eyes and his thoughts from her.

‘That is for you to say.’

‘Oh, that’s not fair!’

But, ‘doctor’s orders’ he had said, and he meant to abide by those orders, no matter what it did to her.

‘I must have done, mustn’t I? I mean—I was there with him—in the car. I wouldn’t have got into a car with a stranger.’

She looked into his face, seeking a response that would help her, but finding only that stony-faced, blanked-off expression that made her think fearfully of the unseeing, frozen faces of the statues of Ancient Greece, carved from cold, unyielding marble.

‘I wouldn’t!’ For some reason she felt the need to repeat it, to emphasise the importance of what she had said. ‘I’m not that sort of a girl.’

He didn’t say a word, but some change in his face, a movement of his head, an expression in those burning eyes, a momentary lift of one black brow that he couldn’t quite control, seemed to question the truth of her assertion.

‘You don’t believe me?’

Angry now, she could no longer stay still. Swinging her legs out of bed, she got to her feet, snatching up the calf-length robe that matched her nightdress and pulling it on, belting it firmly around her slim waist with a rough, jerky movement that betrayed her inner feelings.

This was better. At least her slender height gave her the ability to look him in the eyes, even if he was still some five or so inches above her five-feet-nine.

‘How dare you? You have no right to sit in judgement on me when you don’t even know me—if that is the truth.’

‘I had never set eyes on you in my life until the first day I came to this hospital and saw you lying unconscious in that bed.’

‘Then—then you can’t tell me what I was doing at the time of the accident or just before it and why.’

Her delicate toes curling on the soft carpet, Serena shifted uncomfortably from one foot to another. She didn’t want to think of Rafael standing beside her bed, looking down at her unconscious form from that imperious height. Just the thought of those cold eagle’s eyes watching everything about her, judging, assessing, when she was utterly defenceless, unaware even of his presence, made her blood chill in her veins.

‘You can’t know anything about me—who I am or what I am—so you’ll have to take my word for it that I’m just not that kind of woman.’

‘You may believe that you were not that sort of woman—’

He bit off the sentence swiftly, but not quite quickly enough. Serena pounced on that revealing change of tense.

‘Were not?’ she repeated shakily. ‘Were? What does that mean? What do you know that you aren’t telling me?’

But he wouldn’t meet her eyes. Instead he turned to where little Tonio still lay, sleeping peacefully.

‘I have to leave,’ he said, not even attempting to hide the fact that he was deliberately ignoring her anxious questions. ‘Tonio will need feeding…’

‘No! You can’t do this to me! I won’t let you!’

The sidelong glance he turned in her direction was one of supreme indifference. I can do exactly as I wish, it declared, as clearly as if he had spoken. And you can do nothing to stop me.

Oh, couldn’t she?

Just as Rafael looped the handles of the carrycot over one strong hand she slipped past him, heading for the doorway and positioning herself just in front of it.

‘I mean it!’ she declared, praying that her vehemence hid every sign of the uncertainty that nagged at her.

‘Serena…’ Her name was threaded through with a note of ominous warning, one she knew she would be wise to heed, but she couldn’t bring herself to give up the fight so easily.

‘No. I won’t let you go until you tell me. It’s my life, I have a right to know!’

No, defiance was the wrong approach. It was only hardening his resolve. She could see that in the set of his jaw, the cold light in his eyes, the way they had narrowed, dangerously assessing. Hastily she rethought her plan of campaign.

‘Rafael, please… ‘ she cajoled, carefully adjusting her tone, making it soft and pleading, totally unlike the challenge of moments before.

‘Serena, don’t do this… ‘

Are you sure you know what you’re doing? a small, nervous voice questioned at the back of her mind. Are you sure that you really want to know?

‘No!’

Stubbornly she pushed the weak thoughts away, refusing to let them take root. If she gave in to Rafael now, if she let him go without answering her, then she would have lost her chance for ever. If he defeated her once, he would always be able to do so again.

‘Please—you don’t know what it’s been like! I’ve lain awake at nights trying and trying to remember, but it’s all just a blank—a big, gaping black hole where that day should be. Can you imagine how that feels—how frightening it is?’

‘Madre de Dios!’

Rafael dropped the handles of the carrycot and raked both hands through the shining luxuriance of his black hair in a gesture so expressive of burning exasperation that Serena couldn’t hold back a smile at the knowledge that she was getting through to him at last.

‘You will regret this.’

It was a flat statement of fact, not a threat, and that was what firmed her resolve, making her even more set on continuing.

‘I’ll regret it even more if I don’t find out what you’re talking about. This is my past—my life! How can I ever hope to move on, go forward, if I don’t know what’s behind me?’

Rafael’s only answer was another outburst of explosive Spanish, but at the end of it he flung up his hands in a gesture of defeat.

‘All right, you asked for it! And perhaps it is best that you know the truth. That date you gave… ‘

‘It wasn’t right? I was unconscious longer than I believed?’

‘On the contrary. In all but one detail the date was perfectly correct. The right day, the right month…’

‘But…’ She had to force the word out in a hoarse, tight-throated croak, because it was obvious that there had to be a ‘but’.

‘But it was a year early.’

‘Early? I don’t understand.’

‘The date you gave to the doctor was the right day, right month last year. And you are not twenty-three, but twenty-four. The accident, the injury to your head, left you with partial amnesia. It’s not just the last few days that you can’t remember. You’ve lost a year of your life.’




CHAPTER THREE


YOU’VE lost a year of your life. A year of your life. A year.

The words Rafael had flung at her formed a tormenting, thudding refrain inside her skull whenever she wasn’t thinking about anything else.

And she had too much time to think. Nothing held her attention; nothing distracted her from the appalling fact that she could not manage to come to terms with.

In the daytime she could try to read, or watch television, but inevitably she had found it was impossible to concentrate. She would find that she had been staring blankly at the screen or a page on which not a single word had registered, and all the time those impossible, incredible words had swung round and round in her mind, beating at her brain with a bruising sense of horror. But the nights, in the silence and the darkness, were much, much worse.

You’ve lost a year of your life.

How was it possible? How could this have happened? More importantly, why had it happened? How could she simply forget about a year that she had lived? How could something wipe out twelve months, three hundred and sixty-five days of her existence, destroying it and leaving not a trace of anything behind?

‘No!’

She cried the word aloud in an attempt to drive away the demons of fear and panic that seemed to prowl around her, hidden in the shadows, tormenting her.

She wouldn’t give in to this, she vowed. Wouldn’t go down under the waves of horror that threatened to engulf her. She would fight them with everything at her disposal. Her past couldn’t stay buried for ever. Her memories would have to emerge some day, and she would do everything she could to make sure that day came just as soon as possible.

Not that she had much to go on. Her few belongings were no help. The clothes she had been wearing at the time of the accident had been ruined, but she was assured that they had been strictly anonymous, inexpensive chainstore items, with no distinguishing marks on them at all, ditto her shoes. And the small, battered brown leather handbag that had been picked up at the crash scene held only a purse containing just a few pounds in cash, a comb, a packet of tissues and a key. That was all.

‘If only there’d been a diary, or something with an address on it!’ Serena had wailed when Dr Greene had assured her that nothing had been taken or hidden from her.

‘It’s been left exactly as it was handed to us, I’m afraid. The police have investigated that address in Yorkshire that you gave us, but it turned out to be a dead end.’

‘No help at all?’

The doctor shook her dark head, grey eyes sympathetic.

‘I’m sorry, no. It was just one bedsit out of a dozen or so in an old house that’s usually rented out to students. Apparently when you lived there everyone who shared the house with you was in their final year. They’ve all moved on, far and wide, and very few of them even bothered to leave forwarding addresses.’

‘And Leanne?’

Leanne was someone she’d remembered. A friend from her student days. Her best friend.

‘I went to university late, because my mother was so ill,’ she’d told the doctor, sadness clouding her eyes at the memory. ‘She had ovarian cancer and I postponed my starting date because I wanted to stay at home and nurse her. So I was twenty-two when I started my course. It seemed that everyone else was so much younger than me, and I didn’t really make any friends until I moved into Alban Road. That was where I met Leanne.’

‘You said she’d emigrated to Australia?’

‘That’s right. She was engaged to an Australian doctor and she was going to live with him after the wedding.’

Serena had been invited to the wedding, she knew that much. And she was sure she would have gone. There was no way she would have missed her friend’s big day. But, try as she might, she couldn’t recall anything about it. It seemed that the start of Leanne’s marriage marked the end of the lifetime she could remember.

‘But Australia’s a huge place when you’ve no idea where to start looking. Worse than the proverbial needle in a haystack. I would have had her address somewhere; I know I would! But I’ve no idea where it is now.’

That address must be wherever she had lived in the year since she had left Yorkshire. Because she had learned that much at least. Something had happened to her; something so important or traumatic that she had thrown up her university course and…

And what? Lying awake in the darkness, Serena thumped her pillow in a rage of impotent frustration. The answer to that question was lost, along with her memory.

‘So what do I do now?’

Because she had to do something. The injuries she’d received in the crash were well on their way to mending, the cuts all but healed, even the worst of the bruises fading away completely. Physically, there was nothing to keep her in the hospital any longer.

‘Oh, I don’t think you need to worry about that.’ Dr Greene smiled. ‘Mr Cordoba has it all in hand.’



‘Just what are you up to now?’

Rafael had barely had time to get through the door into her room that evening before Serena rounded on him, flinging the furious question into his face.

‘Up to? My dear Miss Martin, precisely what are you talking about?’

‘You know perfectly well what I’m talking about!’

Serena faced him defiantly across the room, black coffee-coloured eyes flashing fire, her chin up, every inch of her slender body stiff with rejection of his high-handed way of behaving. He hadn’t brought Tonio with him this time, she noted gratefully, knowing that the little boy would distract her from the questions she had to ask.

‘And I’m not your “dear Miss Martin”! I’m not your “dear” anything! You can’t just move in and take over my life.’

‘And how—exactly—am I supposed to be doing that?’

The coolly drawled question incensed her, as did the slow, indolently assessing way those brilliant eyes swept over her, narrowing slightly as they considered the oatmeal-coloured loose trousers and cream tee shirt she was wearing. The insolent sensuality of the survey made her heart kick against her ribs, her breathing catch for a second.

‘The clothes suit you well.’

‘Don’t change the subject!’ Serena exploded, bitterly conscious of the fact that if it had not been for Rafael she would have had nothing to wear, or at least something far less expensive and stylish.

‘This is my life we’re talking about. And you can’t take people’s lives and assess them as if they were some sheet of figures you’ve been handed to check through. You can’t just add up the income and the outgoings, take away the number you first thought of, decide if it’s worth the investment you were planning on, and then draw a nice neat line under everything—done—finished—sorted out!’

Rafael’s laughter had a disturbing edge to it, one that took his response to a point a long, long way from true amusement and turned it into something that sent a trickle of icy apprehension sliding down her spine.

‘Who the devil thought to name you Serena with a temper like that?’ he murmured sardonically, moving to throw his long body down into the easy chair that stood beside the window. ‘But then I suppose I should have expected it from…’

‘From what?’ Serena demanded when he let the sentence trail off unfinished, his eye apparently caught by something in the street outside. ‘You should have expected it from whom?’

She regretted the angry emphasis she had put on the last word as Rafael’s proud head snapped round again, his beautiful eyes no longer warm with any degree of amusement but cold and sharp as if carved from golden ice.

‘From someone with your hair colouring,’ he told her curtly. ‘Fiery hair, fiery temper—isn’t that true?’

‘I—’ Serena began indignantly, but, meeting a flashing warning glance that made her toes curl in fearful response, she hastily gulped down the irritable protest, forcing herself to begin again.

‘Believe it or not, I’m not usually like this. As a matter of fact, I’m usually pretty equable. Oh, don’t you dare look at me like that!’ she flung at him when the twist of his mouth, a tilt of his head questioned her assertion without words.

‘I rest my case,’ he murmured with silky cynicism.

‘If you must know, you make me lose my temper! You drive me to it.’

‘And why is that, do you think?’

‘Why…?’

Totally at a loss, Serena could only shake her head. Why did he affect her in this way? Why was her mental equilibrium so precariously balanced whenever he was around that just a look, a word, a gesture was enough to throw it out completely?

She had never thought of herself as an emotionally volatile person, flying off the handle at the slightest provocation, yet somehow when she was with Rafael she became as uncontrolled as a weathercock, swinging this way and that in response to his passing mood.

‘Because you have to be the most provoking man I’ve ever come across. And the way you’ve behaved is a decidedly excessive reaction simply because I was hurt in your car.’

‘I was brought up always to meet my responsibilities.’

Like Tonio. The thought flashed into Serena’s mind in a moment. Rafael had never explained just what had happened to the baby’s mother, but it was patently clear that he had no intention of being an absentee father. Or had he just moved in on the poor woman, as he was now doing with Serena herself, taking control, taking over, no matter what anyone else wanted?

‘There’s meeting responsibilities and there’s trampling other people underfoot!’

Rafael’s exaggeratedly patient sigh brought her up short, painfully aware of the way it warned her that his grip on his temper was loosening rapidly.

‘Are you going to rant at me like this for the rest of the evening?’ he enquired in a voice laced with acid. ‘Or do you ever intend to enlighten me as to just what is bugging you?’

‘Isn’t it obvious? The thing that’s “bugging” me—’ Serena matched his satire word for word ‘—is that you think you can just make plans for my future and I’ll fall in with them as soon as you snap your fingers. So when were you going to tell me? Today? Tomorrow? When it suited you? Or were you just going to present me with a fait accompli and say, This, and this, and this is what’s going to happen. If you don’t like it—tough!?’

The fact that Rafael didn’t honour her outburst with a reply, but simply continued to regard her stonily, brilliant eyes carefully blanked off, told her all she needed to know. When he looked down his aristocratic nose at her like that, she felt like some out-of-control two-year-old indulging in a petulant tantrum in front of a decidedly bored and critical parent. And that feeling only incensed her more, driving her to rush on without waiting for him to answer.

‘That was it, wasn’t it? I wasn’t going to get a choice. So, tell me, what exactly did you have in mind for my future?’

‘I thought you could come and live with me.’

‘What?’

Unable to believe she had heard right, Serena shook her head disbelievingly.

‘Live with you! No way!’

‘And what else do you propose to do?’ he came back at her swiftly, abandoning his indolent pose and pushing himself to his feet in one easy, lithe movement. ‘You have no money, nowhere to live, no way of supporting yourself…’

‘Do you think I’m not aware of that?’

The fact that only a short time before she had detailed exactly those points to herself did nothing to ease her edgy state of mind. If anything, it made her feel worse.

‘So you had some alternative to suggest?’

The Spanish Inquisitor was back, with a vengeance. Uneasily Serena took a step or two backwards, edging away from his imposing height, the sheer physical force of his presence.

His movement had brought a wave of scent to her nostrils. The clean, crisp tang of some light cologne he wore, and underneath it the deeper, muskier, more intensely personal scent of his body. A perfume that brought all her senses onto red alert, making her head swim, hazing her thoughts.

‘Not yet,’ she hedged warily.

‘Then what is wrong with coming to live with me until you decide what you want to do?’

‘You know what’s wrong with it!’

‘Enlighten me.’

It seemed that the more her temper grew, the more impassive and withdrawn Rafael became, until she felt as if she was banging her fists hard against an unyielding brick wall in a vain attempt to get through to him.

‘I know what you want—what you’re thinking!’

‘Oh, so now you’re a mind-reader. So tell me, Señorita Martin, just what it is that you believe I want from you?’

‘I—you…’ she floundered, unable to find a way to put her thoughts into words.

He must know what she meant. He had to!

Wasn’t he aware of what was between them? Couldn’t he feel it, sense it in the air around them, like the heavy, lowering build-up in the atmosphere just before a violent electrical storm? That the storm hadn’t broken yet was more by luck than good management.

Away from the restricting confines of her present surroundings, it could be a different story entirely. Just the thought of moving into his house made all the tiny hairs on the back of her neck stand up, her skin prickle with tension.

‘Are you going to say what you mean?’ Rafael demanded sharply. ‘Or are you going to stand there all day, throwing out veiled hints because you don’t have the nerve to be honest?’

Not have the nerve! Serena thought indignantly. Right, he’d asked for it.

‘I think you have strong sexual feelings for me!’

There! It was out now, and no matter what she did she couldn’t wish it back. Emboldened by his silence, by the fact that nothing had blown up in her face, she rushed on.

‘Th-that you want me in your bed. I can see it in your eyes, in the way that you look at me when you think I’m not looking. Sometimes I can hear it in your voice too. And don’t tell me I’m imagining things because…’

‘I wouldn’t dream of it,’ Rafael inserted silkily, taking her breath away. ‘Why should I deny something that must be obvious to anyone who looks at me? I’d be all sorts of a fool even to try.’

His voice had deepened, dropping a couple of octaves, becoming huskily sensual so that it coiled round her like warm, perfumed smoke.

‘I don’t want to try.’

She hadn’t seen him move, but suddenly he was close, so close. His awesome height and strength was intimidating, making her breath catch in her throat. If she wanted to, she could reach out and touch him, feel that warm velvet skin beneath her fingertips, slide her fingers through the black silk of his hair.

If she wanted to! Serena almost laughed aloud at the thought.

Oh, she wanted to! She wanted it so much that it was like a pain in her heart. But she didn’t dare. Some inner sixth sense warned her that if she gave in to the yearning, the need that clenched in her stomach, coiled round her body, then the repercussions of that simple act would be cataclysmic. It would be a case of light the blue touchpaper and stand well back. And when the smoke and debris of the resulting explosion cleared there would be nothing left that she recognised, no trace of the world she had known, the life she had lived.

‘You’re a very beautiful woman, Serena Martin. So beautiful that you twist my guts into knots, make me ache to possess you. From the moment I saw you I had one thought in my mind…’

‘One th-thought?’ Serena could only echo his words, her mind refusing to function so that she could form any of her own.

‘In the instant that I saw you there, in that hospital bed, I knew I could never rest until I’d held you, kissed you like this…’

Rafael suited actions to the words, reaching out and folding his arms around her, gathering her close. And she went into his embrace like a sleepwalker, feeling as if this had been meant, as if it had been ordained from the moment she had been born. She had no thought of resistance, of asking why. She only knew that this was how it had to be.

So when that arrogant dark head lowered, she automatically raised hers to meet it, her mouth already softening for his kiss.

But when that kiss came, it had nothing of gentleness. Instead it was as fierce and demanding as the touch of a flame, searing over her skin, scorching her senses, taking, plundering right to the depths of her soul. A raw, shaken cry was driven from her as she swayed on her feet, her arms reaching up to clasp around his neck, slender fingers digging into the powerful muscles that corded his shoulders, clinging on for support.

The whole of her mind was a red, heated haze, burning away all trace of coherent thought under a blazing inferno of sensation. Every inch of her skin seemed to be suffused with the stinging pins and needles of heightened awareness, yearning for his touch, and deep down, at the most feminine centre of her body, a pulsing hunger made her stir restlessly against the hard power of his lean frame.

On a groan of hunger Rafael brought his hands up to fasten on her hips, bronzed fingers stroking the curving line of her waist, the softness of her buttocks, pressing her closer against him. There was no escaping the heated, swollen pressure that indicated the power of the passion that gripped him, the hungry need for her body that he couldn’t conceal.

Wild, crazy images filled her mind. Images of walking, step by step, backwards towards the bed, taking this man with her. Of tumbling down onto the peach-coloured bedspread, imprisoned under the heavy, glorious weight of him. Of his hands following the example of her own and tugging at her clothing, impatiently pushing aside the unwanted garments that came between his touch and her naked flesh. Of…

But there her imagination failed, short-circuited by the sheer mind-blowing reality of her fantasy made fact.

Rafael’s strong, tanned fingers had pushed the cream tee shirt away from the waistband of her trousers and were insinuating themselves underneath the fine cotton, scorching her skin where they touched, drawing heated erotic circles as they moved slowly, inexorably upwards. And the reality was so much better than anything her imagination had invented

Better, and more pleasurable, and more arousing. Reality made her heart race out of control, her skin sting with excitement, as his touch slid over her narrow ribcage to close over the slight curves of her breasts, cupping and supporting their warm weight.

‘Rafael…’ His name was a choked cry, smothered under the pressure of yet another, even more demanding kiss.

Answering the hunger that suffused her, she pushed her hands up between their bodies, pulling roughly, urgently on the buttons that fastened his shirt, yanking them apart in her impatience to be able to touch him in return. The feel of his hot flesh drew a deep, ragged sigh of satisfaction from her, a sigh that blended into a little gasp of pleasure as his hands moved against her breast again. That gasp became a moan as the warm, hard pads of his thumbs unerringly found the sensitive points of her nipples and set up a slow, circular motion that made every nerve waken into screaming need.

She was oblivious to the fact that the door was still partially open, to the sound of movement in the corridor outside. The warmth of the sun coming through the window at her back was just another sensual delight in a bombardment of such pleasures that made her head spin out of control. It wasn’t until a voice spoke, just beyond the door, that any sense of reality impinged on her at all.

‘…I believe Mr Cordoba’s in there right now.’

At the sound of his name, Rafael snapped up his dark head sharply, his stance that of a disturbed predator, every muscle taut, his breathing ragged and uneven, listening intently. Only when the owner of the voice moved away down the corridor did he shake off the wary mood, looking down into Serena’s dazed brown eyes with a twist to his mouth that was half-rueful, half-amused.

‘This is neither the time nor the place for this,’ he told her, releasing her from the seductive imprisonment of his hold and stepping back a couple of paces, smoothing down the ruffled tee shirt as he did so.

From being the ardent, demanding caress of a lover, his touch was now all distance and matter of factly businesslike, the contrast between the two moods so sharp that it drew a cry of protest from her.

‘Rafael…’ she began, but he shook his head to silence her, raking both hands through the dark disarray of his hair to smooth down the disorder her clutching fingers had created.

‘Not here, not now,’ he insisted, with a cold precision that fell onto her heated skin like drops of ice, shattering the glowing mood of moments before. ‘Not ever, if I am wise.’

‘Not…’ Serena choked on the words, unable to believe what she had heard. What had he said? Why had he said it?

Her aroused body still sang in excited expectation, the heightened rate of her pulse still sending the blood speeding through her veins. But slowly, unwillingly, a terrible sense of let-down was creeping over her, cooling the warmth of her skin, making her ache in frustration for the delights she had known and that were now denied her. She felt as if she had been reaching for the stars, only to have them snatched away from her with brutal cruelty.

‘N-not now?’

She couldn’t say the other phrase she thought she had heard. Couldn’t make her tongue form the words ‘not ever’.

‘Miss Martin—Serena…’

In the blink of an eye, it seemed, Rafael had himself once more completely under control. His appearance was near perfect again, his hair smooth, his shirt fastened, his tie restored to order around the tanned column of his throat. And it seemed that in those moments he had also erased every trace of all that had happened between them as easily as he had wiped away the faint trace of lipstick that had transferred itself from her mouth to his.

‘Forgive me. That should never have happened. I apologise for my actions.’

The stiff formality of his words, his stance, stabbed at her harshly. There was a nasty, bitter taste in her mouth and her stomach roiled queasily. How could he take something that had been so—so special, so wonderful, and turn it into a monstrous mistake, all in the space of a moment?

‘There’s no need to apologise…’

Her tone matched his in its stiffness, in the distance she deliberately put between them. Unconsciously, she mirrored his actions of moments before, straightening her clothes, stroking down her hair.

‘I wasn’t exactly forced. I was well aware of what was happening.’

‘Serena!’

His use of her name was a sound of pure exasperation.

‘You have no memory of the past year. Anything could have happened in that time. Until you know what there was in those twelve months, who you were with, you can’t make any decision about the future.’

‘Who I was with—do you know something?’

She watched in something close to despair as his face closed up, heavy lids hooding the brilliant eyes, hiding his thoughts from her.

‘If you did, you wouldn’t say anything, right?’ she continued despondently. ‘Don’t tell me—doctor’s orders.’

‘I had no right to touch you.’

‘And if I wanted to give you that right?’

She knew the answer before the question had even left her lips, anticipated the unyielding shake of his head that took away the last grain of hope she had left.

‘There can be nothing between us while your memories remain elusive.’ Cold and inflexible, his words had the force of a slashing steel blade. ‘Nothing at all.’

‘Then you—you won’t want me to come and live with you?’

‘On the contrary. I still think my original plan is for the best.’

‘Your—your original plan? But if you don’t want me…’

The look he turned on her was pure scorn, blazing over her skin with the force of a laser beam.

‘Madre de Dios! You believed that was the reason I invited you to my home?’

He was pure Spaniard now. Tall and arrogant as any matador, head held high, strong jaw set, his handsome features forming a mask of cold anger, furiously rejecting the implications behind her question. She had insulted him, Serena reflected miserably. Insulted and appalled him and although he hadn’t actually moved away from her she knew that he had mentally taken several major steps away from her.

‘I’m sorry…’ she began miserably, but he brushed aside her interjection with the brusque flick of his hand she had seen him use before.

‘That was not it at all. I was thinking of Tonio…’

‘Tonio!’ Serena almost choked on the word. ‘What has Tonio to do with this?’

‘Everything,’ Rafael snapped. ‘I am a businessman, Serena. I have interests in England, Spain—all over Europe. I work long hours—I could be called away at any time to deal with some crisis. Tonio is just a baby. He needs love and care, someone who can be there with him…’

At last Serena saw the direction in which his thoughts were heading.

‘Someone like me.’

A swift, curt inclination of his head acknowledged the accuracy of her guess.

‘You want me to be some sort of nanny…’

Her voice shook on the words, but whether in laughter or distress she had no idea. She felt perilously close to both, hot tears burning in her eyes so that she blinked hard, determined not to let them fall.

This was what he had meant all along. How could she have been so foolishly naïve? She had thought that he was attracted to her, that he hadn’t been able to resist her. She had believed that he had invited her to stay with him because he wanted to get to know her better. Instead, he had considered the problem—hers and his—quite coldly and come up with a purely pragmatic solution.

She needed a home. Rafael could provide one. He needed someone to care for his child and he had decided that that was a service she could offer in return for her board and lodging. The idea of his wanting her in any other way had had nothing to do with it.

‘But I don’t know anything about looking after a baby!’

‘You will learn.’

Once again her objections were dismissed peremptorily.

‘And I saw the look on your face when I brought him in here. I have no intention of leaving him with some woman for whom this is a job and nothing more. I want someone who would put him first always.’

Someone who didn’t have a life, Serena reflected bitterly, linking the fingers of both hands together and staring down at them in order to hide the expression in her eyes from him. She had nowhere else to go, no one to turn to. He knew that, and had used it ruthlessly against her. He might have couched it in terms of offering her a job, helping her, but he knew only too well that he held all the cards in his hands.

But then she thought of Tonio, of his big, unblinking eyes, and the way his tiny hand had closed around her finger, and her heart clenched on a wave of emotion.

The baby was Rafael’s trump card. He must have seen her face when she had looked down at him, the tenderness she hadn’t been able to disguise. In the first moment she had seen him something deep and primitive had tugged at her heart. There was no way she could turn her back on the motherless infant, and Rafael knew that.

‘You need a home, a place to live while you convalesce and regain your strength, and Tonio needs a nanny. You can live in my home; there is more than enough room for everyone. I have a housekeeper who will serve as a chaperon if you should feel the need of one. I will pay you a decent wage. It’s an arrangement that will suit us all.’

‘It seems very fair.’

It was a perfectly sensible arrangement, Serena told herself drearily. And perhaps, if he had suggested it yesterday, she might have seen it as the answer to all her problems. If he had suggested it before he had taken her in his arms. Before he had kissed her in a way that had changed their relationship for ever.

But he had held her. He had kissed her. And as a result of the dreams she had allowed herself to indulge in, just for a moment, what he now offered her could only ever be second best.

‘Then you agree?’

Did she have any choice?

‘Serena?’ Rafael prompted hardly. ‘I need an answer.’

And there was really only one she could give him. Slowly, reluctantly, she nodded.

‘I agree.’

It was obviously the response he had expected. The swift, brusque nod of his dark head told her he had never anticipated anything else. Pushing back the cuff of his crisp white shirt, he consulted the slim watch that he wore on his wrist, gold against the bronze of his skin.

‘I have to go now,’ he said, brisk and businesslike once more, the matter settled to his satisfaction, his mind already moving on to other things. ‘But I’ll be back in the morning. Dr Greene says that she expects to discharge you then, so I will collect you as soon as she has made the final decision… Around ten-thirty, then?’

‘Ten-thirty.’

But as he turned and headed for the door she found she could no longer hold back. All the feelings, all the hunger he had woken in her came flooding back with such force that before she quite realised what was happening she had opened her mouth and spoken impetuously.

‘Rafael!’

The tone of her voice brought him to an abrupt halt, turning on his heel and swinging round to face her.

‘What is it?’

‘You—you said that—that while I still had no memory then there could be nothing at all between us… But what if things changed? If my memory came back—and I knew all about myself? What would happen then?’

Rafael’s breath hissed in between his teeth as he considered his answer, and the momentary pause made her heart clench in something close to panic inside her chest.

‘If that happened,’ he said slowly, golden eyes burning into hers, holding her unmoving. ‘If you remembered, then things would be so very different. In that case, belleza, all bets would very definitely be off.’




CHAPTER FOUR


SERENA stared out of her bedroom window, struggling to take in what she saw. The contrast with the modest size and facilities of her hospital room, comfortable though it had been, could not have been greater.

There was enough room here to house a family of twelve, an army of nannies, and then some more! The gardens stretched out on all sides, making it impossible to believe they were only a few miles from London. And this was only Rafael’s ‘English base’. The place where he stayed when business commitments brought him to Britain. His family home, he had told her was in Almeria. And he also had an apartment in Madrid.

So what was she doing here, in the middle of all this luxury? How had Serena Martin, a girl from the Yorkshire Dales whose one ambition had been to study History at university and then perhaps teach, ended up living with a Spanish millionaire, ostensibly acting as nanny to his baby son?

‘I told you, I want someone who will care for Tonio,’ he had declared impatiently when, in the car on the way here, she had raised the question that had fretted at her all night. ‘All the qualifications in the world count for nothing if there is no real affection. There are too many horror stories in the papers these days. I prefer to go with my own judgement.’

‘And your judgement says precisely what about me? What can I offer your son?’

‘Two arms to hold him safely, a soft voice to soothe him when he cries. Someone to distract him when he is restless…’

‘Any woman could do that!’ Serena protested. ‘Why does it have to be me?’

‘Are you saying you don’t want the job?’ Rafael questioned sharply, his hands tightening on the steering wheel.

‘No, of course I’m not saying that! It’s just that I don’t see why you are so determined to have me…’





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