Valdez's Bartered Bride. Rachael Thomas

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СКАЧАТЬ could have told you my father would be so calculating, so manipulative—had I known about his other life.’ Raul found himself snarling those last two words, hating the anger that sliced through him with the sharpest of blades.

      ‘He’s your father—doesn’t that count for something?’ Carlos reached for him; the false show of sympathy and understanding in that gesture was too much. Raul moved away. This man was not the friend he’d always thought—not to him anyway.

      ‘I’m done with my father, so much so that I don’t give a damn about inheriting his company. I have built my own as well as expanded his. I don’t need this.’ Raul marched towards the door. As far as he was concerned the discussion was over; there was nothing more to say.

      ‘What about your mother?’ Carlos’s next words halted his steps, kept him from walking out for good.

      Raul remained with his back to Carlos, breathing deep and slow, clenching his fingers into tight fists at his sides. His mother was the only reason he’d spent the last two months trying to find his half-brother, not wanting the press—or anyone else—to get to her first with the revelation of her husband’s secret life. It would finish her.

      ‘You can’t walk away, can you, Raul? You can’t risk her finding out by reading salacious gossip in the press?’ Carlos challenged. Again. Damn him. The man knew just how to twist the situation, how to manipulate him.

      Raul whirled round to face Carlos again. ‘No, I damn well can’t. If not for my mother’s happiness, then for all the jobs which depend on me settling this debt by either finding my half-brother or marrying a spoilt little rich girl. Either way I despise my father for it.’

      ‘So why not take the easy option and marry this Lydia girl?’

      ‘That will never happen,’ Raul spat officiously at him. After the example he’d seen of marriage, he would rather welcome a stranger into his life, into his father’s company. Hell, as far as he was concerned, his brother could have it all if it kept people in work and his mother in ignorance of his father’s past actions. He didn’t need any of it.

      ‘The board are getting nervous, Raul. They think you’ve lost your influence, especially after the Lopez deal fell through.’ Carlos touched yet another raw nerve, ratcheting up the desire to prove him and every damn member of the board wrong. One lost deal didn’t spell the end.

      ‘I haven’t given up on that yet, just as I haven’t given up on the search for my half-brother.’ Raul glared angrily at Carlos, resenting the challenge the man was issuing, inadvertently or not.

      ‘Either way, the debt needs to be settled before the end of the year. Sooner if possible.’

      ‘That’s just over three months away. I’ll find my half-brother before then, settle the damn debt and keep the scandal from my mother.’

      ‘If you don’t, you will have to meet Lydia Carter-Wilson.’ Carlos spoke carefully. Quietly.

      ‘If she is anything like she was ten years ago, I would rather lose my father’s business.’ Raul baulked at the memory of the simpering sixteen-year-old girl on the verge of womanhood who’d looked at him like an adoring puppy. Was that when his father had started loaning funds to hers?

      ‘What about all those people who will lose jobs? Shutting down companies isn’t who you are, Raul. Saving them and building them up, giving the people who work within them, a secure life. That’s who you are and I’ve never known you to refuse a challenge yet.’ Carlos spoke the truth, but Raul was too angry to acknowledge it right now.

      ‘I need more time.’

      ‘If you haven’t found your half-brother by the end of November, I will expect you to announce your engagement to Lydia Carter-Wilson.’

      ‘What if the lady is unwilling?’

      Carlos laughed, defusing the tension somewhat. ‘You will find a way, Raul. Your charm with the ladies has never failed you yet.’

       CHAPTER ONE

      Late November

      LYDIA MENTALLY BRACED HERSELF for battle, because this was one fight she was not prepared to lose. Over the twenty-six years of her life, she’d perfected the art of hiding her emotions and now she intended to use it fully. Raul Pérez Valdez wouldn’t know what had hit him. Ten years ago he’d made her feel totally insignificant, like nothing more than a spoilt little rich girl, and she hated him for that. Ever since she’d gone to live with her grandmother as a child, she’d worked hard to shake off that label.

      Any moment he would arrive and walk through the diners of one of London’s top restaurants to the intimate candlelit table he’d arranged, referring to it as neutral territory in his blunt email. The mood she was now in, he was going to need every bit of help he could get from the chosen venue, which was anything but neutral if his reputation of romancing women was true. It was very much a setting he would be at home in, whereas she was distinctly uncomfortable in such surroundings, having avoided anything remotely romantic after witnessing so many relationships turn sour, including her own supposed happy ever after.

      Irritation filled her as the minutes ticked by. He was late. The time he’d appointed had already passed. Was the man intending to make her suffer even more? Make her so nervous she could easily jump at her own shadow? Or had he decided against the ludicrous deal his father had concocted with hers? Did this mean she was free to go back to her life and not honour the conditions of that deal she’d unwittingly been dragged into? Her father had reached an all-time low with that deal, leaving her to pay the price.

      Except she’d had enough. She didn’t owe her father anything, not after all the years of ignoring her, unless it suited his latest negotiations, of course. Like the time she’d been paraded as a sixteen-year-old in front of the man she was about to meet, as if she was some sort of bait. That plan had failed—or so she’d thought.

      With a huff of irritation, Lydia picked up her purse from the small round table and stood up to leave. She wasn’t wasting any more time waiting for Raul Valdez. If he wanted her father’s debt settled, he could chase around London after her.

      ‘Going somewhere?’ The sultry accent snared her senses and she turned and looked up into the face of a man so handsome he couldn’t possibly be the perpetrator of such dire circumstances. He’d changed, but from the intent look in his inky black eyes she knew without a doubt this was Raul Pérez Valdez, CEO of the Spanish investment bank her father had defaulted to in the most spectacular way.

      Every sculpted angle of his face, from the high cheekbones to the Romanesque nose and the deep-set eyes, sent her body’s senses spinning into overdrive. Memories of being an impressionable girl on the brink of womanhood collided with that reaction and she was unable to quell the erratic racing of her pulse, or the shiver of something she quickly dismissed as nothing more than attraction.

      ‘We had a meeting ten minutes ago.’ Her sharp words did nothing to this specimen of cool reserve. The heavy brows lifted slightly in disbelief—or was it amusement? She couldn’t tell. The intensity in his eyes increased, but she was determined he wouldn’t use his well-known charm on her. She glared at him, hoping the icy coldness she was renowned for showed in all its glory. She wasn’t an impressionable sixteen-year-old any more.

      ‘For my lateness, I apologise.’ СКАЧАТЬ