Sharon Kendrick - Bought Bride For The Argentinian

‘I mean, look at you now—you’re miles away!’ Marybeth was staring at Emily in bemusement. ‘And you’ve got this look on your face, like...’

‘Like what?’ Emily prompted curiously.

‘You’re all wired,’ said her friend. ‘As if someone’s turned on a light inside you and you’ve suddenly come alive. Yet you look scared, too. As if something’s waiting just around the corner for you and you don’t like what it is.’ She paused. ‘You know, you don’t have to accept this job from this guy Alejandro Sabato.’

Emily gave a hollow laugh. ‘What, and turn down the best money and exposure we’ve ever been offered just because I once stupidly had sex with him?’

Marybeth looked shocked—probably because Emily was never usually that frank. Or maybe it was because she’d lived like a nun for so long that her partner thought she was still a virgin.

‘Is that what happened?’ Marybeth questioned. ‘I mean, I guessed there had been someone.’

Emily blinked. ‘You did?’

Marybeth shrugged. ‘Of course. You’re lovely,’ she said gently. ‘But you always clammed up when it came to talking about men and then this really sad look would come over your face, so I didn’t like to pry. And whenever you’ve dated anyone—which doesn’t happen often—nobody has come close to capturing your heart, which suggested it must have been badly broken. Is that what happened, Em—with this guy Sabato? Did he break your heart?’

Emily hesitated as she folded another cotton shirt before adding it to the neat and sensible pile already in her suitcase. She never talked about it because it still had the power to hurt and also because she was aware of how badly she’d handled it—in fact, she couldn’t have handled it more badly if she’d tried. But maybe she should talk about it. Maybe she needed to make sense of it in her own head, so that she could deal with it competently when she came into contact with him again. ‘Alejandro was the housekeeper’s son when I lived in Argentina,’ she began slowly. ‘In the days when my mother was married to Paul Vickery.’

‘That’s the guy who left you the horse?’

Emily nodded. ‘That’s the one. Cruel and calculating, but ultimately very rich—at least, he was when I was a child. My mother was completely in thrall to him, mainly because he’d rescued her from a life of poverty as a widow. My father was a fisherman who drowned off the Cornish coast, but even when he was alive, money was scarce. After he died my mother met Paul and felt as if she’d hit the jackpot. She’d found herself a rich husband who gave her a financial security she didn’t have to work for. It’s one of the reasons why my career has always been so important to me. Why I’ve been determined never to rely on a man like that.’

She heaved out a sigh. ‘And even though he was chronically unfaithful, Paul only had to snap his fingers and she came running, which is what rich men really want women to do—and then they despise them for it. He had a thing about status. A big thing. Socialising in the highest echelons of society was his bag and his stepdaughter mixing with the illegitimate son of the hired help certainly didn’t fit into that image, despite the fact that Alej was clearly going to be a big star in the world of polo. It may have been even more basic than that. Alejandro was at his physical peak and poised on the cusp of glory and my stepfather was getting very old by then—so maybe it was that old lion, young lion thing. When he found out I was involved with Alej, he demanded I finish it.’

‘So you did?’

It sounded weak to admit it now, but, yes, she’d caved in and done exactly as her stepfather had demanded—mainly because her mother had got down on her knees in that over-the-top way of hers and begged her to. Had sobbed that Paul would never forgive her if she didn’t and she couldn’t cope with a divorce and going back to being a single mother. The ensuing drama had felt like an embarrassing nightmare and in the end Emily had agreed. But she’d convinced herself it was all for the best and it would save her even more heartbreak further on down the line, because surely to Alej she was nothing more than a brief fling. A teenage love affair which wasn’t going anywhere—especially when increasing numbers of women were lining up beside the polo pitch to watch him play and making their availability very plain. Just as she’d told herself she would soon forget him. That the latter part of her assessment had never come true wasn’t anyone’s fault, particularly not his.

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I finished it.’

I finished it in the most horrible way possible which still makes me shudder to think about it, which is why I rarely do.

‘So why do you think he’s chosen you to salvage his image, out of all the PR representatives in the world?’ questioned Marybeth slowly.

‘He says he wants to go into politics,’ Emily answered, her brow furrowing into a thoughtful frown. ‘And needs to shed his bad-boy reputation pretty sharpish.’

‘And that’s it?’ Marybeth’s eyes glinted. ‘That’s the only reason he’s employing you?’

It was a question Emily didn’t want to answer as she snapped her suitcase closed and gave Marybeth a bright smile. ‘I guess so. What other reason could there be?’

But she thought about her partner’s question all the way to Heathrow airport and through the long flight which followed, which was delayed further by a technical problem on the plane which was supposed to take them from Brunei to Melbourne. Hadn’t there been a whisper of revenge underpinning the dogmatic way Alejandro had demanded she go and work for him? Was the unspoken clause that he wanted to capitalise on the undoubted chemistry which still existed between them, or was that just her imagination? Because that was never going to happen, no matter what the provocation. No matter that she still found him the sexiest man she’d ever set eyes on, she wasn’t going to tumble into his arms the way she used to do. She didn’t dare. Why would she put herself through something like that when the cold glint in Alejandro’s eyes made no secret of the fact that he now despised her? All she needed to do was to resurrect his battered public image and earn the money he had promised her. Simple.

* * *

It was hot when she arrived in Melbourne—hotter than Emily had expected, though she’d never been to Australia before. She felt grimy and sticky after the long journey but was due to meet Alejandro at the racetrack and reckoned a trip to her hotel to freshen up would make her even later than she already was. So she scurried into a washroom at the airport and did the best she could in the cramped surroundings, but the creases in the clean dress she pulled on were stubbornly refusing to fall out and her cheeks were flushed and shiny.

Passing a news stand, she saw Alejandro’s rugged features staring back from the front page of a tabloid underneath the headline Billionaire’s Racy Race Party!

Digging into her purse for some coins, she tucked the newspaper into her bag and read it during the bus ride to the stadium, hating the way her heart sank as she pored over the feature, thinking how much one of the women photographed entering his hotel resembled his ex-mistress—a fact which hadn’t escaped the notice of the journalist. It gave them the perfect opportunity to print an old picture of Colette and Alejandro kissing passionately at the Monaco Grand Prix and Emily couldn’t rid herself of the image of the supermodel’s long fingers splayed possessively over the Argentinian billionaire’s taut bottom.

She was still feeling peculiar when the bus arrived at the race venue in Albert Park, and the constant droning of powerful cars coming from inside the stadium only added to her feelings of disorientation. Her phone started vibrating and she didn’t need to see the name to know who it was from, as she squinted at it in the sunshine. The terse message blazing from the screen could have originated from only one person.