‘Good. I’ll have my team draw up a pre-nuptial agreement and organise a fast and discreet civil wedding within the next few weeks, after which we’ll leave directly for Spain.’
He had turned and was walking out of the room before the shock reverberating through Trinity subsided enough for her to scramble after him—clearly he was not a man who was easily bluffed. He was deadly serious about this.
His hand was on the doorknob when she came to a stumbling halt behind him, breathless. ‘Wait a minute—you don’t really want to marry me. What about falling in love?’
Cruz turned around with an incredulous look on his face, and then threw his head back and laughed so abruptly that Trinity flinched. When he looked at her again his eyes glittered like dark golden sapphires.
‘Love? Now you really are over-acting. Choice in marriage and falling in love are best left to the deluded. Look where infatuation got my brother—driven to fatal destruction. I have no time for such emotions or weaknesses. This marriage will be one in name only, purely to protect my nephews from your grasping hands, and you will fulfil your role as my wife to the best of your ability.’
Trinity tried one more time. ‘You don’t have to do this. I would never harm my stepsons, or take their inheritance from them.’
Cruz’s eyes gleamed with stark intent. ‘I don’t believe you, and I don’t trust you. So, yes, we are doing this. You’ll need to see if Mrs Jordan is happy to stay in my employment and come to Spain. If not, we’ll have to hire another nanny. The sooner you come to terms with this new reality and start preparing the boys for the move the easier it will be for me to make the necessary arrangements.’
For long minutes after he’d walked out Trinity stood there in shock. What had she just done?
* * *
True to his word, just over two weeks later Trinity stood beside Cruz De Carrillo in a register office. He was dressed in a sleek dark grey suit, white shirt and matching tie. She wore an understated cream silk knee-length sheath dress with matching jacket. Her hair was up in a smooth chignon, her make-up light.
In the end resistance had been futile. No matter which way she’d looked at it, she’d kept coming back to the fact that she wasn’t prepared to walk away from Mateo and Sancho after all they’d been through—as well as the fact that the thought of leaving them made her feel as if someone was carving her heart out of her chest.
By agreeing to marry Rio she’d at least felt that she could offer them some permanence, which she’d never had. She hadn’t wanted them to go through the same insecurity...and now she was in exactly the same position. So it had come down to this: she had nowhere to go, and no one to turn to.
When she’d put Cruz’s plan to Mrs Jordan, the woman had thought about it, consulted with her son who was at university in Scotland, and then agreed to stay with them as long as she could be guaranteed regular visits home. Trinity had felt emotional, knowing that at least she’d have Mrs Jordan’s quiet and calm support.
She was acutely conscious now of Cruz’s tall, hard body beside her as the registrar spoke the closing words of the ceremony. She was all but a prisoner to this man now. The perfect chattel. She looked at the simple gold band on her finger that marked her as married for the second time in her life. This time, though, she thought a little hysterically, at least she wasn’t remotely deluded about her husband’s intentions.
‘I now pronounce you husband and wife. Congratulations. You may kiss your wife, Mr De Carrillo.’
Slowly, reluctantly, Trinity turned to face Cruz. She looked up. Even though she wore high heels, he still towered over her.
Cruz just looked at her for a long moment. Trinity’s breath was trapped in her throat like a bird. Was h
e going to humiliate her in front of their small crowd of witnesses—largely made up of his legal team—by refusing to kiss her?
But then, just when she expected him to turn away dismissively, he lowered his head and his mouth touched hers. Firm. Cool. His lips weren’t tightly shut, and neither were hers, so for a second their breaths mingled, and in that moment a flame of pure heat licked through her with such force that she was hurled back in time to that incendiary kiss in his study.
Before she could control her reaction, though, Cruz was pulling back to look down at her again with those hard, glittering eyes. They transmitted a silent but unmistakable message: he would do the bare minimum in public to promote an image of unity, but that was as far as it would go.
Trinity was humiliated by her reaction, by the fact that he still had such a devastating effect on her. And terrified at the prospect of him realising it. She tried to pull her hand free of his but he only tightened his grip, reminding her of how trapped she was.
She glared up at him.
‘Smile for the photos, querida.’
Trinity followed Cruz’s look to see a photographer waiting. Of course. This was all part of his plan, wasn’t it? To send out a message of a family united.
Aware that she must look more like someone about to be tipped over the edge of a plank than a besotted bride, Trinity forced a smile and flinched only slightly when the flash went off.
* * *
Cruz could hear his nephews chattering happily as they were fed at the back of the plane. Then he heard softer, lower tones... Trinity’s... He tensed. Any sense of satisfaction at the fact that he’d achieved what he’d set out to achieve was gone. He cursed silently. Who was he kidding? He’d been tense since he’d left her standing in that room in Rio’s house, with her eyes like two huge pools of blue, and a face leached of all colour.
It should have given him an immense sense of accomplishment to know he’d pulled the rug from under her feet, but he’d walked away that day with far more complicated emotions in his gut—and a very unwelcome reminder of when he’d seen a similar look of stunned shock on her face...the night he’d kissed her.
She’d been the last person he’d expected to see when he’d walked into his study that night, weary from a round of engaging in mind-numbingly boring small-talk. And fending off women who, up until a few months before, would have tempted him. His mind had been full of...her. And then to find her there, stretching up, long legs bare and exposed, the lush curve of her bottom visible under the short robe and the even more provocative curve of her unbound breasts... It was as if she’d walked straight out of his deepest fantasy...
He could still recall the second he’d come to his senses, when he’d realised he was moments away from lifting her up against his shelves and finding explosive release in her willing body, all soft and hot and wet. No other woman had ever caused him to lose it like that. But she’d been his employee. Someone he’d been in a position of power over.