Page 155 of Modern Romance Collection February 2025, 5-8

She had always considered herself a ‘feet on the ground and muck in’ sort of person, but she realised as she pushed back into the leather upholstery and refused the offer of a glass of wine from the built-in bar, that it would be very easy to adjust to this sort of life.

‘Wake up, sleepyhead we’re here.’

‘Mmm?’ Clemmie blinked and lifted her head fractionally from his shoulder, claiming with a yawn, ‘I wasn’t asleep.’

‘Then you have a serious drooling issue,’ he said, patting his shoulder.

‘We’re here?’Clemmie cried, suddenly becoming aware of her surroundings as she jerked upright. ‘How long have I...?’

She stopped as she took in the building they were approaching.

Maplehurst was considered grand by most people, but this place took ‘grand’ to a new level! Even though she had been prepared to be shocked, she stared in awe at the fortified castle that towered over them. It must dominate the landscape for miles.

‘Welcome to Castillo Perez,’ he said, watching her.

‘It’s not just that this is arealcastle,’ she whispered. ‘I mean...the towers, the walls...it looks like a fortress.’

‘Cosy it is not,’ he inserted drily. ‘It will not surprise you to learn that at one point in its history it served as a prison.’

She spun around in her seat. ‘How old is it?’

‘The templars built the original in the thirteenth century, on Moorish foundations. My family acquired it after the roof was destroyed by fire in the fifteenth century. Back then there were fifteen towers, but we have lost one since then.’

‘Careless,’ she said breathlessly as a sinister-looking metal gate opened across the porticoed entrance to allow their car to sail inside.

‘This is yours? A bit big for one person, isn’t it?’ she suggested, hiding her sudden spike of nerves in flippancy.

‘I haven’t spent more than a week a year here since I inherited—I sometimes forget it’s mine. Actually, several members of the family live here periodically, and they forget too.’

‘And now you’re here to remind them?’ she speculated, finding the play of expressions across his face more fascinating than the courtyard they had arrived in.

‘You could say that.’

Something in his voice made her add. ‘Your mother does know we...Iam coming?’

‘Oh, she knows. We had a cosy little chat about it last night.’ His lips twisted in an ironic smile as he replayed the conversation in his head.

Clemmie frowned as he exited the limo with his usual ineffable grace. Smiling at the uniformed figure who held her door open, she got out and walked around the car to join him. He was adjusting his tie and staring up at the building. Clemmie followed suit and tilted her head back.

‘I don’t believe this place...’

It was impossible not to be intimidated by the sheer size of the building that towered above their heads. She looked around, half expecting someone to greet them.

He correctly interpreted her action. ‘There won’t be a welcoming committee.’

‘But theyareexpecting us?’

‘You keep asking me that?’

‘And you,’ she retorted, ‘keep looking shifty.’

He looked cool and remote. Almost like a stranger, standing there, literally lord of all he surveyed, dressed in an immaculate suit and handmade leather shoes. Perhaps the difference was in the setting and not in him.

He laughed at her accusation, but she noticed he didn’t quite meet her eyes.

With his mother’s parting threat last night in his mind, Joaquin felt a faint scratch of guilt—which he dismissed as irrational. He hadn’t told Clemmie the details of his conversation with his mother because he didn’t want to believe she would follow through with her threat.

He knew she would.

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