She was too vulnerable to him, she realised helplessly. Too easily diverted by things that held no place in this room.
‘He’s gone home,’ he told her. ‘To England,’ he added almost reluctantly.
‘Home? England?’ She repeated stupidly. ‘But he can’t do that!’ she cried. ‘He isn’t well enough to travel! I need to see him!’
Luiz took another couple of steps towards her as she spun round in a full circle so her dazed eyes could check the room out again, as if she expected him to miraculously appear and prove Luiz wrong.
But her father didn’t appear. And as she made herself look back at Luiz the sickly suspicion that this was just another part of his overall plan, to separate father from daughter, began to take a firm grip. ‘You’ve sent him away,’ she breathed.
‘He’s gone home to put his house in order,’ Luiz sombrely replied.
But she shook her head. ‘You made him go so we can’t get together and spoil your plans by coming up with an alternative solution to our problems.’
‘Is there an alternative?’
Gently put, smooth as silk, the question pierced her like the lethal prick from a scorpion’s tail. ‘Then why has he gone?’ she demanded, her heart beating so fast that she could hear it hammering inside her head.
‘Guilt,’ he told her bluntly. ‘He couldn’t face you, so he left before you could get here…’
Deserted her, he meant. Ran away, he meant. Left her here to face the rotten music alone, he meant!
It was too much. She couldn’t bear it. She turned to leave, but not quickly enough to hide from Luiz the flood of hurt tears that burst into being. His hand snaked out, caught her shoulder, stopping her from walking away.
‘Try to understand,’ he murmured huskily. ‘He saw himself last night for perhaps the first time. He saw the mess he had made of his life—the misery he had made of yours!’
‘So he ran,’ she mocked. ‘How brave of him!’
‘It was for the best, Caroline,’ Luiz insisted. ‘He wants to put his own house in order. Don’t condemn him for at least wanting to try before he can bring himself to face you again.’
‘In that case, let him swing for his own wretched debts!’ she responded in swift and bitter retaliation. ‘Find someone else to marry you, Luiz!’ she flashed. ‘Because I am now taking myself out of it!’
With an angry shrug she tried to free her imprisoned shoulder. All that happened was that the hand turned into a grip of steel.
‘I am still paying for him to put his house in order,’ Luiz inserted with deadly precision.
Caroline sucked in some air, held onto it for as long as she could, then let it go again with such violence that it escaped as a sob. ‘So am I, it seems,’ she whispered then.
‘It is what we agreed,’ Luiz confirmed.
And in her mind’s eye she had an image of her father, running away like a frightened rabbit while Luiz stood viewing his departure from his lofty position in his eagle’s nest, happy to let one tasty meal go because he still had another set cleanly in his sights.
Then she shuddered, and stopped thinking right there, because she just didn’t want to know how she was going to describe herself. But still the apt description of a lamb being led meekly to the slaughter managed to fill her head.
And if cynicism could be measured in fathoms, then Caroline knew she was now plunging the very depths as she made herself turn to face him.
‘Do you ever lose, Luiz?’ she asked him.
His grim mouth flexed on a twist of a smile. ‘Very rarely,’ he answered honestly.
She nodded, and left it at that. After all, what was there left to say? She was here because Luiz wanted her here. Her father had gone because Luiz had wanted him gone.
‘So what happens now?’ she asked eventually, knowing the question told him that she was right back on track—just as Luiz wanted.
‘Now?’ he said curiously, his dark eyes fixed on her beautiful but cold amethyst eyes set in an equally beautiful but coldly composed face. And the twist to his mouth became more pronounced. ‘This is what we do, right here and now,’ he drawled—and with only that outwardly innocent warning he caught her by the chin, pulled her face up towards him then kissed her—hard.
She just hadn’t expected it, so the rush of heat that attacked her nerve-ends had taken tight hold of her before she managed to find the will to pull away. Luiz let her go, but only because he was willing to do so, she was sure of that.
And still smiling that twisted smile, even though he had just used that wretched mouth to kiss her utterly senseless, he tapped one of her burning cheeks with a taunting finger. ‘Now that’s warmed you up nicely,’ he noted smoothly.