Carole Mortimer - Mistress to the Mediterranean Male

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CAROLE MORTIMERwas born in England, the youngest of three children. She began writing in 1978, and has now written over one hundred and fifty books for Mills & Boon. Carole has four sons, Matthew, Joshua, Timothy and Peter, and a bearded collie called Merlyn. She says, ‘I’m happily married to Peter senior; we’re best friends as well as lovers, which is probably the best recipe for a successful relationship. We live in a lovely part of England.’

For Peter

‘MR SYMMONDS, would you kindly inform your client that her behaviour when I went to collect Miguel from her home yesterday was unreasonable—’

‘Mr Shaw, would you kindly inform your client that I consider his behaviour yesterday worse than unreasonable—it was positively inhuman!’ Brynne’s eyes sparkled deeply blue and her cheeks flushed with temper as she glared across the room at the man who stood so tall and broodingly remote in front of the window of his lawyer’s office. Alejandro Santiago’s swarthily attractive face was half in shadow as he returned her gaze.

Paul Symmonds, her own lawyer, spoke reasonably as he sat beside her. ‘I’m afraid, Miss Sullivan, that Señor Santiago really does have the law on his side—’

‘Perhaps he does—’

‘There is no “perhaps” about it, Miss Sullivan. The judge decreed three weeks ago that, as I am Miguel’s father, his place is now with me,’ Alejandro informed her glacially. ‘But when I called at your home yesterday, as was prearranged, you refused to hand Miguel over to me.’

‘Michael is a six-year-old boy,’ she said, deliberately using the English version of her nephew’s name, ‘who recently lost the only parents he has ever known in a car crash. He is not some parcel left at the lost-luggage department for you, as his natural father, to just collect and move on!’ She was breathing hard in her agitation, and her hands were clenched at her sides.

What she really wanted to do was scream and shout, to tell this man that, although it might have been proved he was Michael’s natural father, and she was only his aunt by marriage, the little boy was staying with her.

Except she knew that wasn’t going to happen. The legal battle with this man was already over, a private legal battle—a battle Brynne had lost—that had nevertheless received much publicity in the press.

But she wanted to shout anyway.

Alejandro eyed her coldly, his harsh good looks, from his Spanish heritage, completely unemotional.

He was tall, with slightly long dark hair and the coldest grey eyes Brynne had ever seen, his face was all hard angles, and the tailored business suit he wore added to his air of cool detachment. He was a man Brynne had come to dislike as well as fear over the last few weeks as she fiercely opposed his claim on Michael.

‘I am well aware of Miguel’s age, Miss Sullivan,’ he rasped stiffly in response to Brynne’s outburst. ‘I am also aware, as I am sure are you, that, as my son, his place is now with me,’ he added with determination.

‘He doesn’t even know you!’ she protested.

‘I am aware of that too,’ the tall Spaniard dismissed abruptly. ‘Unfortunately there is nothing I can do about the six years of my son’s life that have been lost to me—’

‘You could have tried marrying his mother seven years ago!’ Brynne scorned.

Alejandro’s nostrils flared angrily. ‘You have no idea of the circumstances! Do not presume to tell me what I could or could not have done seven years ago!’ he amended harshly.

‘Damn it.’ Brynne choked, deciding to tell him what he should have done more recently instead. ‘For the last three weeks, since the judgement was ruled in your favour, I’ve been waiting in vain for you to use that time to get to know Michael. But you haven’t even attempted to see him. In fact, I’m not even sure you’ve still been in the same country!’

His hard grey gaze narrowed icily. ‘Where I have been for the last three weeks is none of your—’ He broke off impatiently, turning to the two watching and listening lawyers. ‘Mr Symmonds, can you not explain to your client that she has no legal right to keep my son from me? The only reason I agreed to this meeting today in the presence of our respective lawyers was as a courtesy to her—’

‘So that you didn’t have to go back into court, you mean.’ Brynne sneered in disgust.

‘I do not fear meeting you again in a court of law, Miss Sullivan,’ Alejandro Santiago assured her coolly. ‘We both know that you would lose. Again.’ His mouth twisted. ‘But I accept that you are fond of the boy—’

‘Fond of him?’ she echoed, outraged. ‘I love him. Michael is my nephew—’

‘He is not, in fact, related to you by blood at all,’ the Spaniard told her harshly. ‘Miguel was already four years old when his mother married your brother—’

‘His name is Michael!’ she bit out tautly.

‘Look, Miss Sullivan,’ Paul Symmonds cut in smoothly. ‘I did advise you before this meeting today that you really have no choice but to—’

‘Michael is still deeply distraught by the loss of his parents,’ Brynne continued to protest, still upset herself at the death of her older brother and his wife in the car crash that had left Michael orphaned. ‘I’m sure, when he made his ruling, that the judge believed Mr Santiago would use this three-week interim period to get to know Michael, not that he would just—just suddenly turn up on my doorstep and expect to take Michael away with him!’

Alejandro raised his dark brows, impatiently wondering why this woman continued to fight him. She had done so now for the last six weeks since it had been revealed that her nephew, through her brother’s marriage to the boy’s mother, was actually Alejandro’s son from a brief relationship he’d had with Joanna seven years ago.

If Brynne Sullivan thought that revelation had left him unmoved then she was mistaken, he thought grimly.

It had been awful to read in the newspapers of the horrific motorway crash that had killed eight people, including Joanna and her husband, Tom.

But the photograph in the newspaper of Joanna’s son, the little boy who had miraculously survived the collision, and who bore a startling likeness to Alejandro at that age, had been enough to arouse his suspicions as to the boy’s paternity.

He had followed up these suspicions with discreet enquiries about Joanna and Michael, quickly learning that the little boy had been four years old when Joanna had married Tom Sullivan, and that there had never been a father in evidence before that time.