His Ultimate Prize(47)

But he didn't close his eyes. He kept his gaze fixed firmly ahead. His grip tightened around the wheel.

Her gaze stayed on him as he accelerated the green and black sports car  out of the parking lot. The screech of tyres drew startled glances from  the mechanics heading for the hangar. Marco didn't give a damn.

After a few minutes, when he felt sufficiently calm, he slowed down. 'It's not you.'                       
       
           



       

She didn't answer.

Shrugging, he indicated the rich forest surrounding them. 'It's this place.'

'This place? The race track or Casa de León?'

His jaw clenched as he tried in vain to stem the memories flooding him. 'This is where my mother died eight years ago.'

Her gasp echoed in the car. 'Oh, my God, I'm so sorry. I didn't know. You should've said something.'

He slowed down long enough to give her a hard look. 'It isn't common  knowledge outside my family. I'd prefer it to remain that way.' He  wasn't even sure why he'd told her. Whatever was causing him to act so  out of character he needed to cauterise it.

She gave a swift nod. 'Of course. You can trust me.' Her colour rose slightly at her last words.

The irony wasn't lost on him. He only had himself to blame if she  decided to spill her guts at the first opportunity. Flooring the  accelerator, he sent the car surging forward as his other reason for  wanting to escape the memories of this place rose.

Sasha remained silent until he pulled up in front of the villa. Then,  lifting a hand, she tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. 'How did it  happen?' she asked softly.

Releasing his clammy grip on the steering wheel, Marco flicked a glance  at the villa door. He knew he'd find no respite within. If anything, the  memories were more vivid inside. He didn't need to close his eyes to  see his mother laughing at Rafael's shameless cajoling, her soft hazel  eyes sparkling as she wiped her hands on a kitchen towel moments before  rushing out of the villa.

'For his twenty-first birthday my father bought Rafael a Lamborghini. We  celebrated at a nightclub in Barcelona. Afterwards I flew down here in  the helicopter with my parents. Rafael chose to drive from  Barcelona-five hours straight. He arrived just after breakfast,  completely wired from partying. I tried to convince him to get some  sleep, but he wanted to take my parents for a spin in the car.'

The familiar icy grip of pain tightened around his chest.

'Rafael was my mother's golden boy. He could do no wrong. So of course  she agreed.' Marco felt some of the pain seep out and tried to contain  it. 'My father insisted later it was the sun that got in Rafael's eyes  as he turned the curve, but one eyewitness confirmed he took the corner  too fast. I heard the crash from the garage.' Every excruciating second  had felt like a lifetime as he sped towards the scene. 'By the time the  air ambulance came my mother was gone.'

'Oh, Marco, no!'

Sasha's voice was a soft, soothing sound. The ache inside abated, but it  didn't disappear. It never would. He'd lost his mother before he'd ever  had the chance to make up for what he'd put her through.

'I should've stopped him-should've insisted he get some sleep before taking the car out again.'

'You couldn't have known.'

He shook his head. 'But I should have. Except when it comes to Rafael everyone seems to develop a blind spot. Including me.'

Vaguely, Marco wondered why he was spilling his guts. To Sasha Fleming,  of all people. With a forceful wrench on the door, he stepped out of the  car.

She scrambled out too. 'And your father? What happened to him?'

His fist tightened around the computerised car key. 'The accident  severed his spine. He lost the use of his body from the neck down. He's  confined to a wheelchair and will remain like that for the rest of his  life.'

* * *

Sasha looked after Marco's disappearing figure, shocked by the astonishing revelation.

Now Marco's motives became clear. His overprotective attitude towards  Rafael, his reaction to the crash, suddenly made sense. Watching his  mother die on the race track he'd built had to be right up there with  enduring a living hell every time he stepped foot on it.

So why did he do it?

Marco de Cervantes was an extraordinary engineer and aerodynamicist, who  excelled in building astonishingly fast race cars, but he could easily  have walked away and concentrated his design efforts on the equally  successful range of exclusive sport cars favoured by Arab sheikhs and  Russian oligarchs.

So what drove him to have anything to do with a world that surely held heart-wrenching memories?

She slowly climbed the stairs and entered the house, her mind whirling  as she went into her suite to wash off the heat and sweat of the race  track.

After showering, she put on dark jeans and a striped blue shirt. Pulling  her hair into a neat twist, she secured it with a band and shoved her  feet into pair of flat sandals.

She met Marco as she came down the stairs. The now familiar raking gaze  sent another shiver of awareness scything through her. He stopped  directly in front of her, his arresting face and piercing regard  rendering her speechless for several seconds.

'Lunch won't be ready for a while, but if you want something light before then, Rosario can fix you something.'

The matronly housekeeper appeared in the sun-dappled hallway as if by magic, wiping her hands on a white apron.

'No, thanks. I'm not hungry.'

With a glance, he dismissed the housekeeper. His gaze returned to her,  slowly tracing her face. When it rested on her mouth she struggled not  to run her tongue over it, remembering how his eyes had darkened the  last time she'd done that.

'I have a video call with Tom Brooks, my press liaison, in five minutes. Can I use your study?'

His eyes locked on hers. 'Why's he calling?'

'He wants to go over next month's sponsorship schedule. I can give you a final printout, if you like.'

She deliberately kept her voice light, non-combative. Something told her  Marco de Cervantes was spoiling for a fight, and after his revelations  she wasn't sure it was wise to engage him in one. Pain had a habit of  eroding rational thought.

Being calmly informed by the doctor that she'd lost the baby she hadn't  even been aware she was carrying had made her want to scream-loudly,  endlessly until her throat gave out. She'd wanted to reach inside  herself and rip her body apart for letting her down. In the end the only  thing that had helped was getting back to the familiar-to her racing  car. The pain had never left her, but the adrenaline of racing had eased  her aching soul the way nothing else had been able to.

Looking into Marco's dark eyes, she caught a glimpse of his pain, but  wisely withheld the offer of comfort on the tip of her tongue. After  all, who was she to offer comfort when she hadn't quite come to terms  with losing her baby herself?

Silently, she held his gaze.

For several seconds he stared back. Then he indicated his study. 'I'll set it up for you.'

She followed him into the room and drew to a stunned halt. The space was  so irreverently, unmistakably male that her eyes widened. An old-style  burgundy leather studded chair and footrest stood before the largest  fireplace she'd ever seen, above which two centuries-old swords hung.  The rest of the room was oak-panelled, with dusty books stretching from  floor to ceiling. The scent of stale tobacco pipe smoke hung in the air.  It wouldn't have been strange to see a shaggy-haired professor seated  behind the massive desk that stood under the only window in the room.  Compared to the contemporary, exceedingly luxurious comfort of the rest  of the villa, this was a throwback to another century-save for the sleek  computer on the desk.

Marco caught the look on her face and raised an eyebrow as he activated  the large flat screen computer on the immense mahogany desk.

'Did your designer fall into a time warp when he got to this room?'

'This was my father's study-his personal space. He never allowed my  mother to redesign it, no matter how much she tried. He hasn't been in  here since she died, and I...I feel no need to change things.'

A well of sympathy rose inside Sasha for his pain. Casting a look  around, she stopped, barely suppressing a gasp. 'Is that a stag's head  on the wall?' she asked, eyeing the large animal head, complete with  gnarled, menacing antlers.

'A bull stag, yes.'

She turned from the gruesome spectacle. 'There's a difference?'

The semblance of a smile whispered over his lips. Sasha found she  couldn't tear her gaze away. In that split second she felt a wild,  unfettered yearning to see that smile widen, to see his face light up in  genuine amusement.

'The bull stag is the alpha of its herd. He calls the shots. And he gets his pick of the females.'

'Ah, I see. If you're going to display such a monstrosity on your wall, only the best will do?'

He slanted her a wry glance. 'That's the general thinking, yes.'

'Ugh.'

He caught her shudder and his smile widened.

Warmth exploded in her chest, encompassed her whole body and made her  breathless. Sasha found she didn't care. The need to bask in the  stunning warmth of his smile trumped the need for oxygen. Even when  another voice intruded she couldn't look away.