One-Click Buy: November Harlequin Presents by Susan Stephens

Author:Susan Stephens
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2004-08-31T04:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER FOUR

THE Madrid offices of El Banco de Herrera were lavishly elegant, but Grace was growing tired of cooling her heels—however charming her surroundings.

‘Miss Beresford wishes to know if you are expecting her to sit here in reception all day.’ Javier’s secretary, Isabel Sanches, could not disguise the hint of embarrassment in her voice at she relayed the query to her boss.

Barely lifting his eyes from his computer screen, Javier spoke into the intercom on his desk. ‘Tell her she will remain there for as long as is necessary for me to finish this report,’ he snapped, fighting the urge to remind Grace that if she was that bored she was free to leave—and he’d see her and her father in court.

Dios, he was doing the woman an immense favour by releasing Angus Beresford from his debts—the least she could do was show a little gratitude! Instead she had spent the fifty-minute flight to Madrid moaning that she wanted to go home to her father, and Javier was having serious doubts about marrying her. The woman was a shrew, he thought darkly—albeit a very beautiful one.

He amended several pertinent details on the report, scrolled back to the top of the document and re-read it before he saved it to disc, but as he worked he was unable to dismiss the image of her delicate features and enormous, tear-filled blue eyes from his mind, and with a muttered curse he sprang to his feet and crossed his office to stare out over the city.

Below him Madrid sweltered in the late spring sunshine. He liked the buzz of the cosmopolitan capital. Commercially, it made sense to have the head offices of El Banco de Herrera at the heart of Spain’s major city, and he was happy to spend time at his luxurious penthouse apartment in one of its elegant suburbs. But his heart lay in Andalucia, and home would always be El Castillo de Leon.

Having spent the first ten years of his life living in a filthy caravan, he had at first been overawed by the size and sheer majesty of the castillo. The fortress was a magnificent example of Moorish architecture, but as a young boy he had been more interested in exploring its vast rooms and extensive grounds than learning about its history.

Even now he could remember how good it had felt to finally know that he belonged somewhere. The castle was his home, his heritage, Carlos had told him. There would be no more endless travelling, no more scavenging for food like a wild dog, or spending hours huddled on the caravan steps while his mother entertained her numerous lovers and his father disappeared for days in search of his next fix.

His jaw hardened as he recalled Grace’s taunt that his wealth shielded him from the real world. Little did she know, he brooded grimly. He’d been in the kind of places she couldn’t even imagine. Situations where the toughest ruled with their fists, and the simple task of getting through each day had called on all his cunning.

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