‘But all the same…’
Her grip on the door had loosened a little, her concentration wavering. Luis took full advantage of the situation by pushing it wider and slipping in through the open space. Strolling across the room, he deposited the bottle and glasses on the bedside table, pulled a corkscrew from his pocket and set about stripping the foil from the bottle with swift efficiency.
‘My parents, amada, would be very surprised, not to say concerned, if we didn’t want to spend some time alone together, particularly at this new
and very special stage in our relationship.’
He didn’t look her in the eyes as he spoke, his attention apparently on opening the bottle, extracting the cork as smoothly and skilfully as possible.
‘They believe we have just become engaged. That we are madly in love with each other.’
‘And we both know that that couldn’t be further from the truth!’ Uncertainty and tension pushed the words from her mouth.
Luis’s busy hands stilled suddenly, his whole body freezing into immobility in a way that made her heart clench sharply. But a moment later he had returned to his task, apparently focusing only on that and nothing else.
‘Is that a fact?’ he drawled at last, his words punctuated by the faint pop as the cork finally slid from the bottle.
Isabelle’s heart, which had started to relax, tightened up again, more fearfully this time, as she tried to interpret just what his tone of voice might mean.
‘Here, taste this.’
Luis was pleased with his tone, the smoothness of his voice. He hadn’t missed a beat, covering his reaction to that ill-timed comment.
So what had he expected? That she would have come right out with a declaration of love? He’d have to be dreaming for that to happen. And he’d never thought of himself as a dreamer. All his life he’d lived on purely pragmatic terms—except once, when he’d fallen hopelessly and totally in love with this woman. Insanely in love, because he’d never fully recovered his wits since.
There, he’d admitted it to himself at last. Ever since that moment in York when he’d seen her coming towards him, dressed in that spectacular gown, he’d known he wasn’t over her. The sensation of being kicked in the gut he could explain away as a purely physical reaction—though his thoughts had been at the opposite extreme to pure. But it was the absurd and impossible lifting of his heart that had told him he was in deep trouble.
‘It’s delicious.’
Isabelle’s voice seemed to come from a long distance away, forcing him to drag his attention back to the moment.
‘I thought you’d like it.’
Did she know how the rich ruby colour of the wine had stained her mouth, emphasising the soft fullness of her lower lip? The memory of how sweet that mouth had tasted, how it had opened invitingly under his kiss, instantly triggered his body’s response so that he had to swing away to stare out of the window until he could get himself back under control.
But there was no escape. Even as he stared out at the darkened sky, he could still see her slender, feminine body in the pretty floral-print dress reflected in the glass before him.
‘And perhaps it might relax me. I was too nervous to drink very much at dinner.’
‘Or eat very much.’
He’d hardly touched his food himself, moving it about on his plate in a pretence at interest in it. But all his attention had been focused on the woman sitting opposite, her blonde hair gleaming in the flickering light of the candles, her soft voice answering his parents’ questions with careful politeness.
‘You were every bit as bad as me.’
He hadn’t expected that and it brought him swinging round in shock, amber eyes flying straight to her face.
‘You noticed?’
‘Oh, I noticed. You messed about, but put very little in your mouth.’
Her laugh was slightly shaky, no real warmth in it.
‘I don’t know what your parents must have thought of the two of us. I just hope they don’t think there was something wrong with the food and sack the cook.’
‘Don’t worry, the chef’s job is safe. They’ll think we’re both so completely lovesick that we’ve lost our appetites. And they’ll expect you to have been nervous, so they’ll understand.’
‘I wasn’t nervous! I never felt unsure with your mother and father. They couldn’t have been kinder and they made me feel right at home from the start. That was the problem.’