Daphne Clair – Salzano's Captive Bride (страница 7)

“I hired an investigator,” he said calmly.

“You…?” For a second she was stunned as well as angry. The idea of a stranger prying into her life gave her the creeps. “How dare you!”

“How else could I discover the truth? You lied to me.”

“I didn’t,” she protested unconvincingly, her conscience stabbing. “I told you over and over you had the wrong person.”

“Sí. The first time I came to your apartment. But the next evening you did not deny you had slept with me, written to me.”

“What would be the point?” she said, pushing away a wildly inappropriate mental picture of herself and Marco in the same bed. “You’d jumped to a conclusion, and trying to set you straight hadn’t worked before. I figured nothing I said was going to convince you.”

“You did not say, My sister slept with you in Caracas and had your baby.”

“How do you know there’s a baby?” Her stomach went hollow.

Marco said, “Why else would you have played out that absurd pretence?”

Oh, hell! “Azure’s married.” Surely he could understand that no married woman wanted a previous lover turning up on her doorstep?

He said, “To the boyfriend who abandoned her in a foreign city full of men who had been drinking heavily?”

“It was a misunderstanding.” She was tempted to remind him that by his own admission he’d been one of those men.

Carnaval in Caracas is just so wild! Azure had said. People dancing on the streets wearing fantastic costumes, and drinking like there’s no tomorrow. We were in an outdoor bar, and this skank in nothing but make-up and a few feathers dragged Rickie up to dance. He didn’t even resist. And enjoyed it far too much. We had a fight and he went off in a huff, but I was sure he’d be back as soon as he calmed down. I was sitting there all alone with a bottle of wine, and a guy in a devil costume came on to me, wouldn’t take no for an answer. I was getting scared when Marco came along and got rid of him. I knew Marco was someone important because the staff treated him like he was a lord or something. And we…started talking.

And more. Amber shut that part off.

“Her fiancé walked off to calm himself down,” she relayed to Marco, “but then he got lost in the crowd and couldn’t find his way back.” Or even remember the name of the bar, and had been both contrite and frantic when in the early hours he and Azure were finally reunited at their hotel. “They shared their cell phone, so he couldn’t call her.”

Two hours after Rickie went off, Azure had told her, I was still waiting and I was so mad at him! Marco’s a very sexy man. We’d polished off another couple of bottles of wine and, well, one thing led to another.

“She made a mistake,” Amber told him now.

“You too made a mistake,” he accused her. “Don’t imagine I will be so easily deceived again.”

“Please—she’s happy now and the baby’s happy.”

“I will be happy also, if she proves it is not mine.”

“She said she’s certain he isn’t!”

“And you believe her?”

Amber hesitated for a fatal second and saw his eyes narrow, his jaw tighten. She said, “Surely she should know?”

Two young women came out of the building. “Hi, Amber,” one said, and they paused, obviously angling for an introduction. “We’re going to Cringles for a drink with the usual crowd. Want to come along and bring your friend?”

Amber was unwillingly fascinated by the way Marco Salzano’s demeanour instantly changed. He gave the other women a dazzling smile and a slight inclination of his head. “You are kind, but please excuse us,” he said. “Amber is about to join me for a drink and a private discussion.”

They looked both smitten and disappointed, and one mouthed Lucky you! at Amber as they turned away.

Marco had taken her arm again and he said rapidly under his breath, “Your sister cannot avoid me forever. This time you will tell me the truth.”

Amber stiffened but remained mute. He loosened his hold. “If you prefer we will talk in a public place. My hotel is within walking distance. There is a small bar there that I have noticed is not crowded at this time.”

Amber allowed him to steer her to the street. Somehow she had to persuade him to leave Azure alone. Her brain was telling her this was Azure’s problem. She should just say so and tell her sister to sort it out. But it wasn’t only Azure who would pay for her brief folly. “All right,” she said at last.

At the hotel Marco headed for a bar tucked discreetly into a corner on the ground floor. Only a few people were sitting in tub chairs at the round tables.

Amber asked for a glass of white wine and sipped it cautiously as Marco picked up his red. He’d also ordered a plate of taco chips with sour cream and sweet chilli sauce and gestured for her to help herself before he took one.

Amber’s taste buds awoke at the sight of the platter, and as Marco washed his mouthful down with a sip of wine she thought how oddly intimate it was to share food with a man she couldn’t help thinking of as the enemy.

He put down his glass and regarded her with his head tipped slightly back, his eyes hooded. She recalled the smile he’d directed at her friends, not at all the way he looked at her, glaring with anger and suspicion.

She said, “My sister didn’t say her baby was yours.” Surely Azure hadn’t lied to her about that.

His lip curled. “If she did not intend me to think so, why did she suggest I would be willing to give her thousands of dollars for the sake of the child?”

Amber inwardly winced. Azure did tend to rush into things without thinking. Her family had hoped that marriage and motherhood might temper that trait. “Desperation,” she suggested.

“So?” he said scornfully.

“She…she’d told her husband about what happened in Caracas, and he was upset…angry.” Sometimes Amber thought Azure and her husband were too alike. It hadn’t been the first time in their long relationship that they’d temporarily split after a quarrel. But she supposed no other had been caused by such a devastating revelation. Certainly none had lasted so long.

Marco frowned. “Is he violent?”

“Oh no! No. But he left her and she panicked.”

He said Benny might be anybody’s, Azure had sobbed, finally confessing to her sister why Rickie hadn’t been around for a while. Previously she’d told her family he was working out of town. The big industrial electrical firm that had employed him covered a wide area, and it wasn’t unusual for him to be away for a few days. He said he wasn’t coming back. His family say they don’t know where he is. He even left his job.

“Then her marriage is no more?” Marco asked sharply. “The child is without a father?”

“No. He missed her, and the baby. He loves them both so much. After almost two months he came back. Azure asked if he wanted a DNA test and he said no.”

Thinking she saw a flicker of disbelief in Marco’s expression, she said passionately, “He’s the only father the baby’s ever known, and they’re good parents. It would be cruel to take Benny from them. Cruel to him. And it would break my sister’s heart.” She couldn’t keep the tremor from her voice, her eyes from stinging.

Azure’s greatest fear was not losing her husband again, although Amber knew she’d be devastated, but that Marco Salzano would want to take Benny from her. People with that much money can do anything! she’d cried. Pay top lawyers. Even kidnap him! Kidnapping’s a business in South America.

It was true other children had been spirited off illegally to a different country, some never returned.

Amber too loved Benny, and the thought of him being snatched away made her own heart ache unbearably. How much worse would it be for her sister?

Marco said, “The boy is very young. I have a right—” apparently confirming her worst fear.

“He has rights too! Who knows how a tiny baby feels about being torn from its mother’s arms, taken from everything he’s used to—what long-term effects it has?”

“You are being melodramatic. I don’t mean to—”

Amber ignored that. “You can’t possibly feel the same way they do. You’ve never even seen him.” Repeating all the arguments Azure had used to persuade her to go along with Marco’s mistaken identification of her sister.

“That is why I’m here,” he said. “To see him. And should he be mine—”

“He isn’t yours! If Azure hadn’t written that stupid letter you’d never have known he existed.”

“If she didn’t want me to know, why did she write it?”

Momentarily Amber closed her eyes. If only… But it was spilt milk now. “Her husband had gone, she thought forever, maybe to Australia or further, and he hadn’t paid the mortgage installment due on their house. Every cent they had—” Amber knew that hadn’t been much “—went into buying it. My parents helped, and they guaranteed the loan. If the bank foreclosed, they would have lost their home too.”

His frown deepened. “It was foolish of them to do so.”

Her voice sharpening at the criticism, she said, “Parents will do anything for their children. Or grandchildren. Even if they’re not lucky enough to have a family fortune.” Her father had retired and sold his country house and farm contracting business after a heart attack, moving into a small town house that ate up nearly all the proceeds. “You don’t know what it’s like not to have a lot of money. Or how it would feel to lose a child.”