His eyes drifted lower as he imagined that beautiful skin stripped naked for him to see and touch. Was the rest of it still as smooth as her face was? Did her skin still shine like golden silk? He saw his hands drifting over her, felt the pleasure in stroking such perfection, then frowned as a different pair of hands took the place of his. Old hands, gnarled and withered hands, belonging to the man she had married in his place.
Anger leapt up inside him, growing on a wave of bitter, bloody disgust and contempt.
‘Let’s talk about your marriage,’ he said abruptly.
She stiffened as if he’d shot her, and something flashed across her eyes—gone before he could catch it.
‘My husband is dead,’ she stated coldly. ‘And I will not discuss him with you.’
‘Not even to throw in my face how you married him within a month of turning me down?’
She sent him a silent icy stare in reply.
‘Ordoniz left you destitute. So perhaps I can understand your desire to pretend he did not exist.’
No response again.
‘And your own father was no better,’ he continued. ‘He squandered everything of any worth to that Marques pride you try so hard to hang onto. So take my advice and try not to say the name as if it should mean something of respect to me, because it doesn’t. Okay?’
Okay…He was after her blood now, ruthlessly diminishing her to nothing in a few well-chosen statements.
‘Do you feel better for saying all of that?’ she asked stiffly.
‘Hurt, did it?’
‘Sim.’ No use in pretending that it had not.
He nodded, but did not actually voice the Good. It hung there in the space between them all the same. He wanted payback for every cruel thing she had ever said or done to him. Making her swallow the truth about the Marques pride was only the beginning. There was, she was sure, much more to come.
‘What does Enrique Ramirez mean to you?’ he asked next.
Cristina almost shot from the chair in shock. Never in million years had she expected that name to come up in conversation with anyone! It took every bit of control she had in her to keep her voice level when she said, ‘Enrique who?’
But Luis had noticed her first reaction. His eyes narrowed. Her skin began to crawl with heat.
‘Ramirez,’ he repeated, very dryly. ‘A man of about your father’s age—a good-looking guy when he was in his prime…’ His mouth turned down as he said that. ‘He was a favourite with the ladies…got rich by marrying diamonds and oil. Played polo for Brazil and was a bit of a celebrity here for a—’
‘Polo?’ Cristina looked up, her breathing fracturing.
‘That means something to you?’
‘M-my late h-husband used to train polo horses,’ she told him, looking away again. ‘It was a major part of his life until…’
Her world tilted into silence as a far-distant memory replayed itself in her head. She was seeing a small child, breaking free of her career to run towards the paddock, unseeing of the dangers—how could she see them? She was too young, and she loved horses. Scooting under the fence was the quickest way to get closer to them. She heard a horse galloping towards her, turned to face it, then froze. Wide-eyed, she watched it try to stop short of her, snorting and skidding and in the end rearing up high while its rider tried to stay on its back.
‘Go on,’ Luis prompted, unaware of what she was seeing in her head. ‘Your husband trained polo horses until—?’
‘H-he had an accident,’ she breathed unsteadily. ‘He was trampled beneath one of the horses and was badly injured. He never went near a horse again afterwards, but—’
Her world tilted again, turning her face quite white as she sat there, seeing Vaasco hitting the ground, then the lethal power of the horse’s hooves pounding into him. The horse was confused, scared as it tried to disentangle itself. It reared up again, huge, like a great roaring giant to the small child, then came thundering down with—
Cristina leapt to her feet, gasping sharply—she just couldn’t stop herself.
‘What the hell—?’ Luis was suddenly grasping her arms in support.
It took another shaky breath to pull herself together. ‘I have remembered that I have heard that name before,’ she breathed, lowering her eyes from him and fighting to keep the tremor out of her voice. ‘Enrique Ramirez was the name of the man who pulled the horse away from Vaasco, at great risk to his own safety. I—V-Vaasco owed his life to him.’
‘You added a but before you went as white as a sheet.’
‘Did I?’ The sheet-white face turned perfectly blank.
‘Were you there, Cristina?’ Luis questioned narrowly. ‘Did you witness your husband’s accident?’
An odd kind of smile touched her pale mouth. ‘It happened years ago. I was only a very small child.’
‘Your husband told you about it?’
‘Oh, yes,’ she replied, with strange bitter smile.
‘And also mentioned Ramirez by name?’
‘Why are you interested in Enrique Ramirez?’ She threw in her own question.
‘Nothing important.’
It could have been the imminent arrival of the ordered coffee that made him let go of her so abruptly, but somehow Cristina did not think so—because she might have been economical with the truth just now, but she had a suspicion that so had he been, with his ‘nothing important’ throw-away.
Then again, the way he’d moved away from her like that could have more to do with Kinsella Lane being the person carrying the coffee tray, she decided, as she watched him stride across the room to meet the other woman halfway.
The fact that Kinsella had picked up on the tense atmosphere was clear in the look she sent Cristina before she carefully lowered her gaze.
Anton had seen the look also, and frowned as he reached out to take the tray.
‘A Senhor Pirez has called several times to speak to you,’ Kinsella informed him stiffly.
‘No calls,’ he instructed as the tray changed hands.
‘Senhor Pirez was very insistent.’
‘And you know the drill, Kinsella,’ he responded. ‘When I say no calls, I mean no calls.’
Cristina watched the other woman’s blue eyes glint beneath her lashes before she turned and walked stiffly out of the room. Clearly she did not like his censure.
Had they had a lovers’ spat? she thought nastily. But that was how she felt—nasty and mean and bitter and—