The Hostage Bride

‘I didn’t expect to end up with Sleeping Beauty on my hands.’

He was actually smiling—almost making a joke out of this! If she hadn’t known better, she might actually have thought that he was flirting with her. But she had learned her lesson fast. She would never trust the cold-hearted monster ever again. Even if those deep brown eyes did warm with an unexpectedly soft light, and the beautifully carved mouth looked so kissable when it curved into…

What was she thinking of? Hastily closing off the dangerous route her wayward thoughts had opened up, she switched on a ferocious glare instead.

‘I’m sure you had every move planned with a military precision. But you won’t get away with it, you know!’

‘No?’

One jet-black eyebrow quirked upwards, cynically questioning her furious assertion.

‘You think not?’

‘I know not!’

Felicity struggled up into a half-sitting position, feeling dangerously vulnerable lying down with him looming over her, his face in part shadow where he had blotted out the sun.

‘For one thing, there are laws against such behaviour. And, for another, by now my father will surely have informed the police. You didn’t exactly hide the number of your car and…’

Something about his face, some tiny flicker of response in the depths of those stunning eyes alerted her.

‘What is it?’ she demanded. ‘What have you done?’

But even as the urgent question left her lips the haze of fear and confusion that had clouded her thoughts in the moments of wakening was slowly receding. Her eyes were starting to focus properly, her mind to take in more detailed impressions of her surroundings.

She was still in a car, it was true, still on the back seat of some large, luxurious vehicle. But, now that she looked more closely, she became aware of some very distinct differences between this car and the Rolls Royce in which she had originally fallen asleep.

Where the soft leather of the seat had once been a light fawn, now it was uncompromisingly black. There was no dividing glass panel between her and the seat where the driver—where Rico would have sat. And as she levered herself fully upright at last she saw not the silvery grey metalwork of the original Rolls but the sleek black lines of a very different car altogether.

‘This isn’t your car!’

‘Correction,’ Rico returned imperturbably. ‘This is very definitely my car—my personal property. The Rolls was not. It was the one that Venables hired for you, but it was easy enough to acquire it for my own use. Your original driver was only too pleased to be given the day off, especially when he earned a fat bonus at the same time.’

I just bet he was, Felicity thought, struggling against a swamping wave of misery. The memory of her own foolishness in telling him that his kidnapping hadn’t been the most efficient possible came back to haunt her in horrifying detail. How could she have been so reckless—so crazily stupid? She had even laughed at him, for heaven’s sake!

‘You…’

The black tide of horror made her voice shake and she shrank back against the far door of the car, getting as far away from him as was possible.

‘How—how did you get me from the Rolls into this…?’

The faint smile grew, curving into a wicked, malign grin.

‘Isn’t that obvious, gatita? I carried you.’

Her throat closed up at the thought, her stomach heaving nauseously. The image that her mind threw up of herself in his arms, her body limp and totally at his mercy, her eyes closed, all defences down, made her shudder in appalled distress.

‘How dare you?’

To her relief anger came to her aid, the hot, thick force of it driving her fear before it.

‘How dare you even touch me!’ Her voice rose high and tight and her grey eyes flashed fire in defiance. ‘You had no right! No right at all! If you ever do that again, I’ll kill you!’

To her fury, her reaction only seemed to amuse him, his smile incensing her further.

‘So the kitten has claws,’ he murmured with silky mockery. ‘I can see I shall have to be prepared to defend myself.’

If her rage had been merely an annoying fly, easily flicked away and dismissed, he couldn’t have made his contempt more obvious. The disdain with which he shrugged off her impotent threat had her clenching her hands tight against her thighs, struggling with the impulse to use them on that arrogantly handsome face.

‘Oh, go to hell!’ she spat furiously. ‘Just leave me alone!’

‘Willingly,’ he responded smoothly. ‘But I can’t help thinking that you would be much more comfortable inside. You can’t stay in this car all night. For one thing, I think the weather is about to change.’

A quick glance at the sky confirmed the truth of his words. The brilliant sun of earlier in the day had been eclipsed by gathering clouds, which were growing thicker and darker by the minute. But it was worse than that. Some of the intensity of the sun had also faded, leaving her in no doubt that the evening was drawing in. Just how long had she been unconscious while they were on the road? How far could they possibly have travelled in that time—and to where?

‘And I’m sure you must be getting hungry. If you just come into the house—’

‘No.’

Felicity shook her head firmly, her chin setting stubbornly.

‘I’m not going anywhere with you. You can’t make me.’

His sigh was a blend of exasperation and resignation.

‘Felicity, querida, you cannot stay out here.’

‘I can do whatever I want! And it’s Miss Hamilton to you!’

Damn him, he was laughing at her again, the soft sound of his amusement adding fuel to the fire of indignation blazing inside her.

‘Don’t be foolish, gatita. You must be stiff and uncomfortable, and in need of something to eat and drink. Come with me…’

The appalling thing was that she was tempted. That the strong, tanned hand he held out to her actually looked as if it was proffered in a gesture of friendship, of assistance. But she’d been caught that way once before and she didn’t intend to let it happen all over again.

‘Señorita.’ The edge to his voice revealed how much she was testing his patience. ‘You are not making this easy on either of us. If you would just come inside then we could handle this situation in a much more civilised manner.’

‘I don’t want to make anything easy for you! And, quite frankly, “civilised” in the last word I could ever use to describe you! Nothing on earth could ever induce me to set foot inside that house—’

‘Not even if I promise to let you phone your family?’ Rico inserted smoothly, interrupting the flow of her tirade.

‘Phone?’

Abruptly all the fight left her with the speed of the air being expelled from a punctured balloon, leaving her limp and weak.

‘You’d let me do that?’

The arrogant dark head moved in a swift nod of acquiescence.

‘But only if you come inside.’

His tone was huskily seductive, pure enticement in a silky murmur. It was the voice that the serpent must have used to tempt Eve in the Garden of Eden and Felicity found herself weakening dangerously.

The longing to speak to her parents, to hear a friendly voice in the middle of this nightmare was overwhelming. She had never felt so alone, so lost and anxious—not even on the day that she had discovered precisely how much of a mess her father had made of his life, the dangers he had created for his family.

‘The first thing you can do as soon as you are inside is ring your parents, reassure them that you are well. I’m sure they would be glad to hear from you.’

They would be going out of their minds with worry. Hot tears rushed into Felicity’s eyes at just the thought.

‘You wouldn’t deceive me about this?’

The sheen of moisture in those dove-grey eyes was Rico’s undoing. If there was one thing he had never been able to cope with, it was a woman in tears. Maria had wept all over him when she had found out about Edward Venables’ forthcoming marriage and that was why he was here, now, seeing this woman’s tears threaten and knowing that he was the cause of it.

‘Trust me on this,’ he said huskily.

Once more that big, strong hand was held out to her, and this time, after a moment’s hesitation, she tentatively put her own into it. The way that her fingers disappeared when he folded his around them was almost shocking; the paler skin swallowed up by the tanned power of his grasp.

‘Come, belleza,’ he encouraged. ‘Come with me.’

And slowly, cautiously, she let herself be drawn with him, sliding over the soft leather of the seat. She was almost out of the car when a new idea came to her, flashing into her mind with a force like lightning so that for a second she paused, one foot just reaching out to the ground, wondering if she could possibly risk it.

She had no idea at all where she was. The car was parked at the top of some wide, winding drive, thickly lined with trees. Just a few yards away stood a large, elegant house, the heavy wooden door already open onto a wide, spacious hall. Clearly, Rico had unlocked the door before he had come back to the car to waken her.

The house or the drive? Felicity asked herself, mentally veering backwards and forwards between the two options.

The drive must lead to a road—but how far away—and what was beyond that? And if she ran for the drive, then Rico could simply get into the car and come after her. Hampered as she was by the long skirts of her dress, the delicate satin shoes with their fine, high heels, she doubted if she could manage to run very far or very fast for very long.

But if she could make it to the house then she could slam the door to and hopefully bolt it against him. He had already said that there was a phone in the hall. Even if she only managed to win herself a few free seconds, then surely it would be long enough to ring the police and scream for help? The house was her best bet.

But first she had to disable Rico, at least for a moment or two.

‘Felicity?’

Her hesitation had caught his attention, which gave her the cue she wanted.

‘I—I’m sorry…’ she managed to sound convincingly hesitant. ‘I don’t feel…’

The pretence of faintness, of still feeling the after-effects of the sedative, gave her an excuse to free her hands from his, pressing them to her forehead, hiding her eyes.

‘Are you not well?’

He actually sounded concerned so that she allowed herself a small, secret grin of triumph behind her concealing fingers.

‘Just a little unsteady. If I could just…’

She needed to keep her hands free so, instead of taking his again, she let them rest lightly on his arm, using his strength to support her as she got to her feet.

It was a mistake that almost distracted her from her purpose. In the moment that her fingers closed over the taut, powerful muscle, the hard bone underneath the fine material of his jacket she felt her heart jolt, her breath catching sharply in her throat. An electrical sense of awareness sizzled along every nerve, making her head spin, but this time for real. Rico was so close that the unique scent of him filled her nostrils, warm, potent, musky, totally alien and yet strangely, disturbingly familiar in a way that set her pulse racing hotly.

This time her unsteadiness wasn’t totally feigned as she slid out of the car and slowly stood upright, using his strength as her support. She didn’t dare to look up at him, fearful that those dark, probing eyes might be able to read her feelings in her face and recognise her response for the lightning bolt of white-hot sexual awareness that it was.

‘Lean on me, if you like.’

Lean on him? Felicity thought on a wave of near hysteria. If only he knew just how she longed to do just that! How her hot, throbbing, dangerously aroused body yearned to throw itself towards him, to rest against the hard wall of his chest, feel those powerful arms come round her.

No! She couldn’t afford even to let herself think of such things or she would waver in her purpose, forget what she had planned. She had to act now or it would be too late.

‘I…’ she began, her voice convincingly low and weak.

‘Si?’

As she had hoped, he bent his dark head towards her, in order to hear better. It was now or never.

White teeth digging into her lower lip in concentrated determination, she brought her right arm up and out, elbow bent sharply, aimed straight at that square, determined jaw. In the same moment that it connected with the hard strength of bone, jerking his head back, she launched a wild kick at his nearest ankle, allowing herself a faint smile of pleasure as she heard his muffled grunt of pain. For just a split second she was free and she took full advantage of the moment, hitching up her white silk skirts and sprinting for the door.

She only managed to get a few feet before a hard hand closed over her shoulder, pulling her back. An arm snaked round her waist, clamping tight around her slender frame, and, kicking and struggling, she was lifted bodily from the ground.

‘Oh, no you don’t, señorita!’

Rico had been anticipating the escape attempt. It was quite shocking to realise just how well he had come to know her, even on such a short acquaintance. But just the brief exchanges—he could hardly call them conversations—as they had had on the journey here, had taught him so much about the way her mind worked. He hadn’t expected that she would have so much spirit. That she would be prepared to take him on quite as openly as she had. But he’d observed and learned and as a result he had had a good idea of what was coming.

It was that tiny grin that had given her away. A smile that she had thought he couldn’t see but which had put a light into her eyes that warned him she was up to something. So he had been ready for the moment she attacked, anticipating the movement of her arm, ready to dodge the full force of it. The vicious little kick to his ankle was more of a surprise, but he soon recovered from that.

‘You don’t get away from me that easily!’

‘Let me go!’

She tried to fight; tried to kick out at him again but the long skirts of her dress hampered her and the whirling veil covered her face, half-blinding her.

‘Careful, belleza…’ It came out unevenly as he fought to adjust his grip on her, trying to hold her more securely. ‘You’ll have us both on the ground.’

‘Do you think I care?’

Furiously she writhed against his restraining hands until the only thing he could do was lift her higher, his arm going round her waist, the other supporting her legs, her head against his shoulder.

‘Now perhaps you’ll do as you’re told!’ he flung at her, clamping down hard on the sudden blaze of anger that had flared inside him, making him want to shake her roughly, drive some sense into her.

But even as he spoke Felicity moved, her arms coming out in an automatic, instinctive movement to close around his neck in order to make herself more secure. Her action brought a faint rush of perfume to tantalise his senses.

The fragrance of rose and lily was fresh and sweet, but it was what came with it that delivered the real kick, awakening everything that was truly male and sexual within him. The clean, delicate, and yet potently erotic scent of this woman’s skin and hair, the feel of her warm, soft curves in his arms made his body tighten in hunger and respond with fierce arousal all between one blink and another.

And as Felicity’s head went back against his shoulder and eyes the colour of an autumn mist met his own sensually darkened gaze, Rico knew that he had just made one of the worst mistakes of his life.

CHAPTER FOUR

IT HAD been bad enough when he had managed the change of cars a couple of hours earlier.

Then at least she had been deeply asleep, totally oblivious to what was going on. Her body had been limp and unresponsive, those soft grey eyes closed and hidden from him.

Now they were staring straight into his, the sparks of fury and rebellion still burning deep in them, making them shimmer in angry defiance. Her skin was flushed with the after-effects of their undignified tussle, her mouth slightly open as she tried to control her uneven breathing.

He didn’t want to think that it might not just be the physical exertion that had set her pulse racing. Didn’t even want to consider the possibility that she too might feel the sudden singing tension that had gripped him. Could she sense the abrupt, dangerous change in the mood of the moment, the shift in the sensual temperature that had turned it from winter chill to midsummer heatwave in the space of a heartbeat?

‘I’m going to take you inside,’ he growled, shocking himself with the way that his voice didn’t sound like his own but had suddenly become rough around the edges, thickening revealingly. ‘And if you’re wise you’ll not try any more crazy stunts.’

‘What did you think? That I was just going to sit there and let you do what you wanted with me?’

‘I’d given you my word.’

‘Oh, yes, and I know just how much that word is worth. You gave me your word that you wouldn’t harm me even while you were feeding me drugs to knock me out.’

‘I’ve already told you, I never planned for quite that effect.’

He was striding towards the door as he spoke; the ease with which he carried her weight a testimony to the true strength of the muscles beneath that superbly tailored jacket. And the terrible thing was that she had suddenly lost all the will to fight.

It was as if in that frantic dash towards the house she had drained what little strength she possessed, leaving herself limp and incapable of movement.

Oh, who was she trying to kid? Felicity reproached herself inwardly. Her sudden mental paralysis had nothing at all to do with her mind and everything to do with an injection of white-hot physical excitement that had set her body throbbing in urgent response. The sensations searing through her in reaction to the forceful, warm strength of Rico’s taut male body so close to hers, the scent of his skin in her nostrils, the iron-hard support of the arms that held her made her skin burn until she felt she was in the grip of some delirious fever…

‘And did you not think that maybe a mild sedative was perhaps a kinder way out than others I might have taken?’

‘So what do you expect from me? Thanks? Gratitude for the fact that you didn’t treat me any worse than you already have?’

‘Oh, no,’ Rico tossed back, caught on the raw by the sudden switch back to cold contempt.

For a second there she had seemed almost to treat him as a human being. But now the lady of the manor act was right back in place, those soft smoky eyes hardening to the grey of the sea on a winter’s day. Immediately he felt his own feelings change in response as anger put a sharper edge on the volatile cocktail of responses he was already prey to.

‘Gratitude would be the last thing I’d expect from you. After all, the woman who was going to marry Edward Venables…’

Something about her sudden stillness, the shocked, blank look in those misty eyes, brought him up short.

‘Oh, come now, querida,’ he derided sardonically. ‘Don’t tell me that you had actually forgotten. That it had somehow slipped your mind that today was to have been the happiest day of your life.’

She had forgotten, Felicity realised, her mind hazing over in shock. She could excuse herself by saying that the way Rico had exploded into her life with all the force of a whirling tornado had numbed her thoughts, making it impossible to think. But the truth was both deeper and less complicated than that.

Since the moment that she had first set eyes on this darkly devastating man, her mind hadn’t been her own. It was as if he had taken possession of it, filled her every thought with the stunning force of his presence, wiping away any memories of who she had been, how her life had been.

‘You didn’t remember.’ Rico’s voice was thick with contempt. ‘You…’

‘Put me down!’ Felicity inserted sharply, hating the scorn in his voice, hating the way he looked at her, dark eyes bleak and cold. ‘Put me down at once! I can walk—’

‘Oh, no, querida.’ The hateful mockery grew sharper, lacing his tongue with cynical acid. ‘How could I deny you the moment that every woman dreams of? The moment when all the fantasies of her childhood, the hopes of her adolescence come to fruition.’

The beautiful mouth had curled into a brutal sneer, the sexy accent heightening on each word. But the sound of his voice no longer made her toes curl, her skin tingle in delight. Instead it was like the lash of a cruel whip, flaying away a protective layer of skin so that she shivered at the feel of even the air against her flesh.

‘Don’t be cruel!’ It was a cry of protest.

‘Cruel, gatita? Cruel?’ he taunted. ‘I am not being cruel. I am simply ensuring that your day ends as you had hoped it would—with you in the arms of a very rich man indeed, being carried over the threshold of his house…’

As he spoke, he suited action to the words, mounting the steps to the front door, shouldering it open, carrying her over the threshold into the cool shadows of the hall.

After the light of the sun, Felicity fond that she was temporarily blinded, unable to see anything clearly. And what made matters worse were the weak tears that filmed her eyes; tears she was determined not to let fall. Rico’s words had stabbed straight to her heart and twisted in it, but the truth was that they had hurt so much because they were so very far from reality.

She doubted that Edward would ever have thought to follow any of the traditions of a real wedding, at least as far as she was concerned. Once the formal, public ceremony and the lavish reception was over, he would probably have dropped all pretence at being the loving bridegroom, the part he had acted so unexpectedly well over the past month or so. Instead he would have reverted to the role of cold, calculating schemer, the man who had manipulated both her life and that of her father in order to get just what he wanted.

Right now she didn’t know who was worse—Edward or Rico.

‘For such a beautiful bride as you are, it is the least I can do.’

Once inside, with the door kicked closed behind them, he paused, ebony eyes going towards a room on his left and just once, very briefly, glancing towards the stairs.

‘So now that I have carried you over the threshold, mi ángel, what next, I wonder?’

Rico had bent his arrogant dark head down to murmur in her ear, the warmth of his breath stirring the tendrils of her hair, brushing softly against her cheek.

‘If you were truly my bride—mi esposa—I know exactly what I would do…’

And his body knew it too. He knew he should set her down, put her on her feet and move well away. That was the sane, the only safe approach. But with her in his arms, with the scent of her skin all around him, the last thing on God’s earth he felt like was playing it safe. And he certainly didn’t feel sane. Instead he knew he was totally out of control—completely crazy and dangerously off balance.

His heart was pounding, his blood flowing hot in his veins. Every sense he possessed clamoured in hunger, insistently demanding appeasement, making him ache with need. And the feel of those soft arms around his neck, the yielding pressure of her feminine body against his chest and the brush of her hair against his neck were almost more than he could bear. He wanted to drop her straight to the floor in order to end the sweet torment and yet at the same time he wanted to hold on to her so as to prolong it for ever.

‘But I’m not your bride!’

Felicity knew she had to break the spell that that low, husky voice had been weaving around her weakened senses. Listening to it had been like sliding slowly but irresistibly into a bath filled with warm, golden honey. She could feel it flowing around her, enfolding her, threatening to close over her head at any moment.

‘I’m not your wife and I never will be! I’m just your prisoner, your captive—here under duress because you forced me into this! And whatever fantasies you might be harbouring, you can forget them right now! You lay one finger on me and I’ll—I’ll…’