Sophie Weston - More Than A Millionaire

Abby met his eyes and found they were like a caress. The warmth was palpable. Instinctively she turned towards it, like a flower to the sun. She could almost feel her skin being stroked.

She brought herself up short. Caress? Stroked? What was it her father had said? She thought that people always meant what they said and she had to learn that they didn’t?

Learn, she told herself feverishly. Learn. Whatever it feels like, it’s not real. No glamorous man wastes caressing glances on a scrubby teenager unless he has some ulterior and probably unkind motive.

No, she definitely didn’t want him lulling her into anything. She took refuge in briskness.

‘That we don’t sell plants. You can have a leaflet about the old roses. You can go on the waiting list to come to one of the summer open days. That’s it.’

‘Where does the leaflet come from?’

Abby grinned. The grin lit up her face, making her briefly beautiful. She did not know that, of course. ‘Me mainly.’

He stared at her for an unnerving moment. But in the end all he said was, ‘What’s it about?’

Abby laughed aloud. ‘Rose of Castile, introduced by the Crusaders in the twelfth century, red, pink or white with occasional stripes. Very strong fragrance. I think it smells like Turkish Delight but some people think that’s unkind. The White Rose of York, of course. White with golden stamens. Another strong pong, less headachy than the Rose of Castile. Sweetbriar. Pink. True rose scent. The leaves smell like apples.’ She ran out of breath and sent him a naughty challenging look. ‘Shall I go on?’

‘You’re clearly an expert.’ He sounded slightly put out.

Well, at least he had stopped looking languorous. Though that was a two-edged sword, because he stood up and she saw how the muscles bunched and relaxed in the graceful movement. Abby could not remember ever noticing the way a man’s muscles rippled before and she lived in a house in which it was virtually impossible to avoid them. She flushed again, hating her transparent skin.

He said abruptly, ‘Who did you come with? I didn’t see you earlier, did I?’

‘I’m staying here. This afternoon I was with Señora Montijo watching the tennis…’ She made a discovery. ‘You’re that tennis player,’ she said, without thinking. ‘The one who beat Bruno.’

Briefly his eyes flashed. ‘Oh, you’re a friend of Bruno’s, are you?’

‘No. I’ve only seen him from a distance. In fact his grandmother was annoyed with me for not recognizing him when you were playing him, I think. The house is full of photographs of him and I should have known which was which. Especially as—’ Realisation hit her. ‘You’re Emilio Diz. You’re famous.’

How right she had been to resist that caressing look. Not just a glamorous man but the guest of honour! An international tennis star who according to Felipe Montijo had been dating movie stars for years! And she had nearly let him lull her into—well, into—she was not quite sure what. She knew she was blushing furiously.

Emilio saw the fierce colour rise and said goodbye to any more untainted conversation.

So this was where the little crane fly asked for his autograph, after all. He sighed inwardly. Well, as long as it was only his autograph. Too many teenage groupies wanted a kiss. Or more. The incident in Paris had left a scar. He braced himself to be kind but firm.

He misjudged her.

‘You shouldn’t be here talking to me,’ said Abby, so agitated that she leaped to her feet, to the imminent danger of decency, as the straps of her dress fell further. ‘You should be mingling. They wanted you to meet—I mean, you’re important.’

Emilio laughed aloud. ‘Not that important.’

He reached out and twitched her straps back into place, one after the other. It was a passionless gesture, almost absent. He might have been tidying a younger sister. But Abby was suddenly breathless.

His hand fell. His eyes grew intent.

She said hurriedly, at random, before he said anything she couldn’t deal with, ‘I know that Señor Montijo wants you to meet some people.’

He took a step forward. ‘Met them.’ He did not sound as if he could be bothered to think about it further.

‘But you’re the guest of honour, aren’t you?’

He flung back his head and gave a great laugh at that. It revealed a long tanned throat. He was as strong and beautiful as the horses in the Montijo stables. And about as tame, thought Abby, shivering with a nervousness she only half understood.

‘Guest of honour?’ said Emilio Diz scornfully. ‘Is that what you think I am?’

‘Th-that’s what they said,’ said Abby faintly. She did not want to remember what else Rosanna and her friend had said about him, in case she started blushing again.

‘Then let me put you straight. As far as the Montijos and their kind are concerned, I’m a commodity.’

She didn’t understand.

His eyes glittered. ‘I’m a guy from the wrong side of town and I always will be. I have no advantages except an ability to hit a ball over a net at a hundred miles an hour plus. That gets my photograph in the papers. That’s what they like. When the papers find someone else, the Montijos won’t even remember my name.’

It was what the Montijo matriarch had said, too, so it must be right.

‘Oh.’

Abby knew she ought to feel sympathy for him. Maybe even indignation. But she was shaken by these new little tremors and she could not think about anything except that golden skin under his crisp white shirt. About how his muscles moved like some great cat’s, lithe and powerful and potentially deadly. About how easy it would be to slip her hands inside—

Fortunately he was not a mind reader.

‘I shall do business with Felipe Montijo. Maybe even with some of the other men here tonight. Eventually. I’m on my way up and they can be useful. I have a family to educate.’

A family? A family? This golden puma of a man was married?

Quite suddenly Abby’s trembling stopped as if she had been unplugged from a power source.

‘But I am not a performing monkey,’ said Emilio Diz, not noticing. ‘I’ll talk to who I want.’

‘Well, don’t waste your time with me.’ It came out much more rudely than she meant. She didn’t mean to be rude at all. But quite suddenly she was desperate to get away from this scented nightmare. ‘I haven’t had anything to eat. I ought to go to the barbecue.’

His eyes narrowed.

‘You circulate,’ said Abby. She was fighting a desire to cry, which was ludicrous. She hadn’t cried once in all this horrible week. ‘I’ll get some dinner.’

But he wasn’t letting her go so easily.

‘We’ll both get some.’

He took her back to the party, skirting the band and the dancers on the lawn. She could feel people watching them. Some with interest. Some with envy. Some—heaven help her—with amusement. She stumbled on the grass and he put an arm round her.

‘Sit here. I’ll get you a plate.’

Biting her lip, she perched on the fallen tree stump he indicated.

A waiter—these people had a waiter at a barbecue?—gave her a glass of something. Abby took it but didn’t drink. She was shivering. She did not want to drink. She wanted to run.

But Emilio Diz was coming back with plates and forks, followed by a couple of men bearing the most enormous tray of meat Abby had ever seen in her life.

And quite suddenly she was the envy of every woman in the place. She could feel the air change around her. He gave her that caressing smile again, the one that started in his eyes and slid straight down her spine. And everyone looked. That slid down her spine, too.

So Abby had to smile and say thank-you and pray her dress would stay up.