Page 12 of Spanish Marriage Solution

‘I do care about him,’ she said quietly. ‘That’s why I wanted to take him home. The country his parents came from, to the family that—’

‘He was born Spanish. He is Spanish. And I am his family.’

Her jaw firmed and a spark leapt in her gaze, hot and burning. And he felt the same fire in him respond.

He should look away, he really should.

‘I’m not leaving, Sebastián,’ she said fiercely. ‘I want to see my nephew and I will see him. You’re not going to stop me.’

The sun was behind him, sending long fingers of light across her face, bathing it in glory. She wasn’t typically beautiful, not as Emily had been. It was her spirit that was beautiful, that caught him by the throat and refused to let go. That made him want to sweep away all the dishes on Lucia’s perfectly set table and grab her, haul her over it and into his arms. Put his mouth on hers and finally ease the hunger of years.

But he didn’t. He couldn’t. Following his own wants and needs had always been a mistake, and he wasn’t going to start now. Besides, he had the honour of the Castellanos to uphold, and dukes did not do such things.

What does it matter if she sees him? Dukes aren’t petty either, they are capable of justice and magnanimity.

He could do that. He could allow her to stay, and once she’d seen Diego and spent time with him she’d leave. In the meantime, he’d simply keep his distance from her. And if she insisted once again on taking Diego, he’d get his lawyers to deal with her. That way they could avoid any dangerous situations like this one, where anger only fuelled the fire that burned between them.

‘Fine,’ he said, his voice little more than a growl. ‘You have three days. No longer.’

Then he did the only other thing he could.

He shoved back his chair and walked away.

CHAPTER FOUR

THE NEXT MORNING Alice sat in the dim, cool living room of the hacienda, a ball of nervous tension sitting in her gut. Her palms were sweaty and her heartbeat loud.

It was silly to feel so nervous about meeting a four-month-old baby, but she couldn’t help it. She’d read all the books she’d been able to lay her hands on about babies when she was pregnant the first time, so it wasn’t that she didn’t know what to expect. It was only she had no actual practical experience with children, and what if she was terrible at it? What if she dropped him? What if he cried and refused to be comforted?

Emily hadn’t called her at all after his birth, but she had emailed, and the only thing Alice had known about him from those emails was that he was a good baby who settled well and hardly ever cried.

‘Do you know that he takes a little time to settle and that he loves a Spanish lullaby? That he also likes the sound of horses’ hooves during the day and will only nap if he can hear them? Do you know that his first smile was three weeks ago and for me? And that when he cries, sometimes only I can settle him?’

Sebastián’s voice from the night before at their aborted dinner drifted through her head, deep and fierce. His expression had been hard yet the smoky gold of his eyes had shone like pirates’ treasure at the bottom of a dark sea.

Her mouth had gone dry then, even as her own anger at him and his intransigence had leapt. He just...burned. He was that warrior with a sword in his hand and a baby in his arms, determined to protect. Determined to keep.

All she’d been able to think about was how hungry she was for a piece of that determination, that possessiveness. Because Edward hadn’t had either, or, if he had, he’d never displayed it towards her.

He’d told her after she’d lost the baby, after she’d lost any hope of having a family of her own, that it would all be fine. They could adopt or even have a surrogate, anything she wanted. Yet every time she’d try bringing the subject of a child up again, he’d wave her gently away or agree vaguely, and then never follow up on it. He hadn’t touched her the way he once had, either. Sex had become perfunctory, as if he’d been doing it because he’d had to, not because he’d wanted to. And then, in the last year, they hadn’t had sex at all.

She’d always had issues around her femininity, largely driven by her parents’ constant comparison—even if unconscious—to Emily, and in the last year of their marriage, Edward had made her feel as if she’d actively repulsed him. She’d tried to talk with him about it but he hadn’t been interested, and it hadn’t been until the car accident and Emily’s letter that she’d found out why.

Edward had had a child with another woman. Her sister.

But she couldn’t think about that now. It hurt too much and, anyway, her feelings about the whole thing weren’t important. Only Diego was.

She took a breath as Sofia, his nanny, came into the room, a small wrapped bundle in her arms.

Alice got to her feet, resisting the urge to wipe her hands down the front of her denim shorts.

Sofia said something soft in Spanish that Alice didn’t understand—Lucia had told her that Sofia didn’t speak English—and then put the little bundle into Alice’s arms with an encouraging smile.

He was heavier than Alice had expected and warmer too.

She looked down into his face and met Emily’s wide blue eyes staring back at her.

Her throat closed, her vision full of unexpected tears, but she forced them back. Perhaps she should have expected the likeness but she hadn’t, and the complex wave of grief and joy that swamped her took her by surprise.

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