The Spaniard's Marriage Bargain. ABBY GREEN
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again. She looked down, straight into the huge violetcoloured eyes of her son. Her heart stopped. And started again painfully. He was trailing an old and faded blanket. His cheeks were still sleep-flushed, his hair standing up. And her heart clenched so tight for a second that she felt in serious danger of fainting again. She willed it down.
Hungrily her eyes roved over him, as if checking a newborn for all his fingers and toes. She longed to pull him up and hold him close but didn’t. She knew it might scare him. Just this moment alone was worth everything—put things into perspective. Isandro and his threats faded into the background.
Her voice was husky with emotion. ‘Hi, Zac.’
One chubby hand clung to her leg for support. With his other hand he proudly mimicked her, pointing to himself. ‘Zac!’
Then he put a hand to his head and made a face, obviously making the connection between Rowan and the previous day, when he’d fallen.
‘That’s right—you fell. Did you hurt your head?’
Zac nodded and rubbed his head. Rowan bent down and pretended to feel for a bump, exclaiming and making a fuss as if she’d found one. Her hands shook with the intensity of her emotions. Zac started to giggle.
Just then an older woman in a dark dress came up behind Zac. She looked Spanish. She bent down and took Zac’s hand to lead him away, looking curiously at Rowan.
‘I’m María—Zac’s nanny…’
Rowan held out her hand. ‘I’m Rowan…’ She balked then. What did she say? I’m Zac’s mother? I’m Mrs Salazar?
But the nanny didn’t wait for elaboration. She smiled, shaking Rowan’s hand perfunctorily. ‘Excuse me—he needs to have something to eat.’
Rowan nodded jerkily and waved goodbye to Zac, who was already speeding off, his interest taken by something else. She turned back and looked sightlessly out of the window at the blanket of whiteness. She was too numb for tears and her heart ached. Yet she couldn’t help but feel deep-seated relief at seeing Zac so well and healthy. That had always been her only priority…to see him flourishing so beautifully…it justified her decisions. Not that she’d ever needed justification. She’d acted from day one on a primal instinct that had been so strong she’d had no choice but to follow it. Above all she hadn’t wanted him to suffer a moment’s pain, which a selfishly prolonged departure would undoubtedly have brought. Even for a baby.
The one thing she hadn’t counted on was this. Being in this situation. She wondered if she was being selfish coming back, seeking Zac out…wanting to get to know him. She knew rationally that she wasn’t, but somehow she still didn’t feel deserving of this. This luxury of seeing her son, this happiness. Perhaps she should have stayed away, said nothing. Let them get on with their lives. But with shameful weakness she knew she hadn’t had the strength to do that. As soon as she had known that things were different, that she had a chance…
‘You were hungry?’
Rowan’s head whipped around. She’d been so caught up in her thoughts she hadn’t heard Isandro come and sit down in the seat across the aisle. He was tieless and jacketless again, as if being in a suit even for a short time constrained his vibrant male energy. His shirt was open at the throat, revealing the strong brown column…. What was wrong with her? Although she’d been undeniably attracted to Isandro from the moment she’d first seen him, she couldn’t remember experiencing this carnal level of attraction before.
‘Yes. Starving.’ She glanced at her plate, which was wiped clean of the delicious paella and salad she’d been served.
Isandro frowned as he recalled her curled up figure on the couch last night. There was something defenceless about the image that tugged at him. He ignored it. ‘You didn’t eat at the hotel?’
Rowan flushed and shook her head as his eyes ran up and down her form disparagingly.
‘You’ve lost weight.’
He sounded accusing, and Rowan bristled. ‘I know.’
He didn’t have to spell out with that look just how unappealing she was to him. In that moment a blur of blond launched itself at Isandro, and deftly he plucked Zac up into his arms before he could do some damage or bump into something.
He glanced over to Rowan, showing the first tiny chink of something approximating warmth. ‘As you’ve seen already, he’s at the stage where he hasn’t quite got the ability to stop once he’s started.’
Rowan felt a lump come into her throat as she saw Zac wrap his arms around Isandro’s neck, hugging him close only to just as abruptly squirm his way down Isandro’s body, toddling off again under Isandro’s watchful gaze until his nanny reclaimed him. The easy intimacy between them was a reminder of something she’d once foolishly allowed herself to believe in, and she could see now how potent it was when it was truly lavished on someone else. All she’d experienced however had been the surface emotion. Not the depth.
She couldn’t quite meet his look. ‘You’ve done an amazing job. He’s beautiful.’
‘Surprised?’ came the dry response.
Rowan looked up, her eyes snared by his. She shook her head. ‘No. I had no doubt that you would be a good father—’ She stopped herself abruptly because she’d been about to say My only concern was that you would not make enough time for him… But that would have been revealing too much, and she could lay that fear to rest now. Clearly Isandro thought nothing of taking Zac with him on business trips.
Something in her tone made Isandro’s eyes narrow on her for a second. Her eyes seemed to swirl with something indefinable, and for the first time since seeing her again he saw shadows, depths that hadn’t been there before. Pain?
She looked away for a moment, and when she looked back her eyes were clear. They were so like Zac’s that it took his breath away momentarily. But the ambiguity in their depths had gone. A trick of the light. That’s all it had been.
At that point the hostess came to tell them the plane was preparing to land. When she had moved away, Isandro surprised Rowan by moving swiftly out of his seat to crouch in front of hers, a hand on either arm of her seat, effectively trapping her.
She could feel the heat from his body. Instinctively she pulled back into the seat, feeling claustrophobic. He was looking up at her with such intensity that she had to force herself to speak—‘What? What is it…?’—just to try and veer her mind off the dangerous track of previous experiences… moments when he’d looked at her before with that same intensity.
His eyes held her with all the easy hypnotism of a magician. His voice was deceptively light. His words were anything but.
‘Just this, Rowan. If you come close to doing one thing to endanger, hurt or harm a hair on Zac’s head then, believe me, not a court in this world will grant you custody when we divorce. I won’t hesitate to use the full force of my power, and you’ll be lucky if you even get to read about him in the papers as he grows up.’
He smiled, and it was so cold that Rowan could only stare. Transfixed by this absolute stranger. Then he stood and moved to a seat at the back of the plane with the effortless grace of a panther. Rowan stared at the place where he’d been. She felt cold inside. What would Isandro say if he knew she’d already laid down her life in order to protect Zac? Not much, she guessed bleakly. As he’d said himself, nothing would ever absolve her of that crime in his eyes. Rowan sighed and looked out of the window, just as the plane landed with a bump on Spanish soil.
Their journey to the east of Seville did not take long. Rowan looked out on the rolling plains of La Campina, barely able to take in the surroundings, still struggling to absorb everything that was happening. Isandro drove the Jeep. She was in the front, and María was in the back with Zac in his car seat. The bodyguard, who had been introduced to Rowan as Hernán, followed behind in another vehicle.
She was momentarily diverted when they entered the