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PROLOGUE
‘MUST you leave us toh of you Your father and I go to the coast in one week, as you know Spend it here with us? Just one more week of your time; it’s not too much to ask?’
‘Sorry, Marey eyes as he accepted his mother’s huff of exasperation In her mid-fifties Isabella Maria was still the dark-haired, proud-eyed Spanish beauty his English father had fallen fathoo when he had been in his ned hi the rest of his life with
Isabella Maria drew herself stiffly upright in her brocaded chair ‘Hah! Sohere!’
A log fell in the huge stone hearth, sending sparks flying Javier unfolded his long legs, left the squashy confines of the sofa and went to tend the fire, a necessary indulgence now that the cold winds from the snow-capped peaks of the Sierra Nevada heralded the approach of winter His father’s, ‘Don’t nag the boy, Izzy,’ brought a wry smile to his flattened mouth as he accepted the truth of what his mother had said
He’d loved this place as soon as he’d set his fascinated eyes on it as a seven-year-old when his parents had bought it as a holiday home A former Moorish caravanserai, it lay in the heart of the tiny Andalucian town behind a stout studded door, the building arcaded around a flagged courtyard, which in summer was filled with the heady scents of roses, myrtle and lilies
Since his father’s retirement and health problee in Gloucestershire, to him and spent the summers here but left for their home on the coast inter pressed down fro there until after the Easter celebrations
‘There’s nothing I’d like better than to stay on,’ he aded position in front of the hearth, his wide shoulders lifting in a resigned shrug beneath the fine black cashmere that moulded his impressive torso ‘But I have a problem’
‘The business?’ Lionel Masters put in sharply He had retired three years ago, handing over the reins to his only son, but he still took a keen interest in the construction business he and his one-tiht to impressive success, noorld beater in Javier’s more than capable hands
‘Nothing like that,’ he quickly put his father’sdrily, ‘Business probleoes by the name of Zoe Rothwell’
Two simultaneous expressive ‘Aah!’s were followed by a silence so intense Javier could hear his heart beating Heavily
He glanced at the slihly fifteen minutes Solita, the resident housekeeper, would announce that dinner was served Best spell it out, get it over with
‘Yesterday, as I was leaving ain Madrid I received a call from Alice Rothwell on my mobile She sounded at the end of her tether and—to leave out the histrionics—it boils down to a blunt deuardianship because Alice can’t and won’t cope any longer’
‘And?’ Isabella Maria arched fine black brows and laid a dramatic hand on her silk-clad breast ‘How could Alice think this is possible? I always thought she was a strange old woman—so cold and priue! Why should she think you can care for her little granddaughter? It would be different if you had a wife But you do not’
Registering the latent disapproval in that last stateave back a wry shrug As an only child his confirreatest anxiety since he had reached the age of twenty-five three years ago His eneration to think of—well, wasn’t there?
But Javier was nowhere near ready to tie himself down; he enjoyed his male freedom far too much He worked damned hard so he was entitled to play hard He enjoyed women, lovely, sophisticated creatures who shared his view that only an immature fool could mistake old-fashioned lust for love
‘Zoe can no longer be classed as a child,’ Javier pointed out at last, ignoring the barb about his wifeless state ‘She’s sixteen The worst kind of bolshie teenager, according to her grand to return to boarding-school, skulking around the house, playing loudAlice a load of grief Which she wants to hand over to me,’ he ended drily