The Spaniard's Revenge

‘I’m afraid you’ll have to take me as I am.’

‘My pleasure.’

‘I don’t have anything clean to wear,’ Sophie explained, viewing her bloodstained jeans. It was a relief to have something else to stare at apart from Xavier’s dark eyes.

He could find no way past her defences. ‘That isn’t a problem. You know my mother,’ he added when Sophie looked at him blankly. ‘She insisted there should be a boutique here. Go,’ he said, gesturing towards the bathroom when she hesitated. ‘I’ll be back in about an hour.’

She had no money to shop. But there was a fluffy cream robe hanging in the bathroom, Sophie remembered. She would just have to put her underwear on after her bath and wear that.

Back in his own suite, Xavier wondered why, of all the doctors in the world, fate had sent him Sophie Ford. Taking a moment to consider, he felt the unmistakable tug of sexual hunger—and it was getting stronger all the time. Why, of all the women in the world, did he want her so badly? And why—when it should have been a simple matter to take her to bed—was he making them both wait? Maybe because the last time he’d seen her she was just a kid. But now… Folding his arms across his chest, Xavier’s expression hardened as he eased on to one hip and stared unseeing through the window into the darkness. She was an adult member of the Ford family. She deserved everything she had coming to her. The chase was on, he mused grimly. The champagne aperitif to the full-bodied claret of sex—he loved them both.

The only thing holding him back was that the suggestion of a relationship with a member of the Ford family might be enough to return his mother to her sickbed. He couldn’t—he wouldn’t risk it. She had suffered enough pain at the hands of the Ford family. But then, what he had planned for Sophie Ford wasn’t about to cause his mother a moment’s discomfort, Xavier reminded himself.

He ground his jaws together as he conjured up a picture of Sophie naked and demanding in his mind. She wasn’t afraid to stand up to him, and she would come to his bed, he determined with a harsh smile of anticipation. She was a modern woman—she understood her own needs as well as he knew his own. He would take his pleasure and they would go their separate ways. The irony in the situation appealed to him. It was a relationship that would suit them both—the temptress and the avenger—both finding satisfaction in their own way.

Sophie could have remained soaking in the warm, scented bubbles till night, but a soft female voice coming from the bedroom brought her to her senses. By the time she had climbed out of the Jacuzzi and wrapped herself in the robe, there was no one to be seen. But someone had been in the room, and that someone had left half a dozen carrier bags behind. On top of one of them lay a stiff ivory vellum card printed with the del Condor name in a flourish at the top. Picking it up, Sophie read the bold black handwriting underneath.

Now don’t be difficult. Consider these an advance on your wages. Xavier.

She should have known his mother would include a fashionable boutique in her plans. But she should refuse, Sophie thought, viewing the line of carrier bags suspiciously. She would refuse, she decided firmly.

It wouldn’t hurt to take a peek inside them first.

She couldn’t refuse, she realised, swallowing hard.

Letting the robe drop to the floor, she plucked out some underwear first: a cobweb of lace held together by a ribbon of silk. Turning it this way and that, she decided he had got the size about right—and then blushed. Xavier had weighed her up pretty accurately, Sophie realised as she settled her breasts inside the minimalist restraint. The matching thong was something else—it tied at the sides. She made a double knot, and then lost the best part of five minutes and two nails undoing it again. He was hardly going to pounce on her; that wasn’t Xavier’s style. Looping it once, she turned back to the carrier bags. Wide-legged linen trousers in cream, and a sky-blue silk sleeveless top with a low-cut neck were simply irresistible, if only because she had never imagined in a million years she would get the chance to wear anything so glamorous in her life, let alone in Peru.

It was almost impossible to convince herself she had made a practical choice for eating dinner and discussing business—but she kept the clothes on anyway, and slipped her feet into some simple cream leather mules she found in another bag.

‘Are you ready yet? Can I come in?’

‘Just a minute.’ Dinner and business—and nothing more, Sophie reminded herself fiercely, as she hunted through the remaining bags. Somewhere she had seen some toiletries—basic make-up, a hairbrush…

‘Make yourself decent. I’m coming in.’

Groaning with frustration, she emptied all the bags out on the floor and then pounced on what she needed.

She looked like a child on Christmas Day, Xavier thought. His heart lurched in a way he hadn’t anticipated as he watched Sophie rooting through clouds of tissue paper and the new clothes he had sent her as a prelude to seduction. ‘I’ll go out again if you’re not quite ready,’ he offered casually.

‘No, no, that’s fine. I’m ready,’ Sophie said, hastily gathering everything up. ‘This is far too much,’ she protested as he walked over to help her. ‘I’ll never be able to pay you back.’

‘Don’t be too sure,’ Xavier murmured as he picked up the beautiful designer swimming costume she had just dropped on the floor. ‘I’ll get my money’s worth out of you one way or the other.’

‘Don’t you be too sure,’ Sophie countered, ignoring the icy fingers that clutched at her spine as their gazes met.

Dinner was possibly the most delicious meal Sophie had ever tasted in her life: a selection of pasta in the lightest, most flavoursome sauces, and salads designed to seduce the palate. There were so many delicacies she couldn’t even begin to try them all.

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