No, it didn’t. She went pale. ‘I’m just a convenient means to an end, then,’ she said, seeing just how conveniently vulnerable to persuasion she had been for him. He hadn’t even had to woo her, just make her an offer she couldn’t refuse.
‘As I am to you,’ he pointed out coldly. ‘Which seems pretty fair all the way round, don’t you think?’
She found herself stumped for an argument because, put like that, he was right! Luiz waited, though, ruthless devil, until he was sure she was not going to throw him yet another tantrum on some other quickly thought up charge.
Then, ‘Can we go now?’ he requested, oh, so sardonically. ‘Only I have a lot of things to do before we leave here in the morning.’
Leave…
He was doing it again! Knocking her off balance with yet another one of his little surprises! ‘Leave for where?’ she gasped out.
‘Cordoba,’ he replied, then turned on his heel and strode back to the car.
Caroline followed—did she really have any choice? she angrily mocked herself. ‘What’s in Cordoba?’ she demanded, the moment she was back inside the car.
‘A small valley in the mountains that goes by the name of Valle de los Angeles,’ he explained as the car began to accelerate. ‘And there in the valley stands the Castillo de los Angeles, which belongs to Luiz Angeles de Vazquez, Conde del Valle de los Angeles…’
And if she thought she’d plumbed the depths of cynicism in her own way a while back, then Luiz was now demonstrating what little she knew about cynicism at all.
‘There, el conde,’ he continued in the same nerve-wincing tone, ‘will wed his betrothed in the church of the Valle de los Angeles, as is tradition for all condes del Valle de los Angeles. Then he will carry his bride off to his impressive castillo—just in time to banish the resident wicked witch before he ravishes his new Condesa.’
‘Wicked witch?’ she quizzed, picking out the only part in the acutely sarcastic agenda that managed to completely baffle her.
‘Sí.’ He nodded. ‘Doña Consuela Engracia de Vazquez—the present Condesa del Valle de los Angeles.’
‘The lady your uncle mentioned earlier,’ she remembered.
‘Sí,’ he said again. ‘Tío Fidel is a very shrewd man,’ he allowed. ‘He is also the only member of my family that you can safely trust,’ he then added, more seriously. ‘It will be wise of you, querida, to mark that I said that…’
CHAPTER SEVEN
MARK it, he’d said…
But twenty-four hours later it was Luiz who seemed to be marking what he’d said, Caroline noted, as the closer they got to Cordoba, the more uptight he became.
Sitting beside him, she stared at the forever-changing vista beyond the car window and wondered what it was that was eating into him today. He should be happy, she mused testily. After all, he’d got himself one very meek and obedient passenger here, who hadn’t put up a single protest against his arrogant take-over of her life—well, not since her performance out on the Marbella road yesterday, anyway.
But then she hadn’t been given the opportunity to protest about anything else, she reminded herself. Because as soon as he’d delivered her back to his villa Luiz had shot off again with his security chief, and she hadn’t set eyes on him until he’d come to collect her for this journey this morning.
And he had arrived dressed for travelling, in a lightweight black linen suit and white shirt, looking almost as uptight as he did right now!
‘Are you ready? Is that your case? Do you think we can go, then?’ Terse to the point of rudeness, he had barely given her chance to reply. And other than for a quick down and away glance at the dusky mauve skinny top and cream tailored skirt she had chosen to wear for the journey, not once had he allowed himself to make full eye contact with her.
Because he’d known that to do so would give her an invitation to start speaking her mind again. Something Luiz obviously didn’t want. Something Luiz obviously still didn’t want, since he’d maintained that barrier throughout the whole time they had been travelling.
Maybe he was afraid she was going to start demanding to know where he had spent last night, she mused with an acidity that stung in her blood. Because he certainly hadn’t spent it with her, in his own bed. And he might be refusing to look at her, but she had certainly looked at him enough to notice the signs of a man who hadn’t got much sleep!
She had, she recalled smugly. She’d slept like a baby and hadn’t even missed him until she’d woken up this morning to find the place beside her was still as smooth as it had been when she’d fallen asleep!