The Thorn in His Side (17 page)

‘Why can’t you accept them?’ Rafael was unable to hide his annoyance.

‘It feels like you’re rewarding me for … for favours.’

The absurdity of the comment made him see red. He had put effort into this gift and she was throwing it back in his face, quoting stupid principles to excuse bad manners.

‘I am not paying you for sex!’

‘It just feels that way, sorry.’

Rafael was so furious he considered walking out, and then she produced another one of those uncensored comments that always captivated him.

‘I’d pay you.’ The eyes that were lifted to his face were filled with a helpless longing. ‘I spend all day thinking about …’ that she could still blush was both ridiculous and charming ‘… the time I’m with you …’

‘Forget it,’ he said, sliding the box into his pocket.

They spoke no more of the gift, but the following night when he handed her a brown document folder it was with the instruction not to open it.

‘It is not a gift, just the deeds to the factory in your name. Not payment, simply the fulfilment of my part of our deal.’

‘But that wasn’t our deal—you said if I could prove I could run things you would put me in as a manager.’

He raised his brows. ‘I think you misunderstood. It was always my intention to divest myself of this company to you or someone else.’ He shrugged. ‘It is all the same to me, but in my experience when something good
falls in your lap you should not refuse it. You have heard the rumours of how I made my fortune, how I started out?’

‘Some,’ she admitted.

‘Well, the truth is that one of my mother’s … friends. My mother had many friends. This one left one night, my mother was heartbroken. It was actually several days before I found the jacket he had left behind. In the pocket there was a stone. He was a big poker player so I’m assuming that he won it in a game. I doubt he ever knew what it was. I on the other hand had read a book on diamonds. I recognised its value. It now belongs to a Russian oligarch who had it cut—one day maybe I will buy it back.’

‘So you kept the stone?’

He laughed. ‘Well, I did not hand it in at the local police station. It was several years later that I had it properly valued. By then my mother was dead and it gave me a chance to make something of myself.’

‘You were alone?’

‘I was used to looking after myself. Some of my mother’s friends did not like the idea of baggage so she was asked to choose.’

Libby’s heart ached for the little boy he had been who had been left behind.

‘I was big and strong for my age. There were many people willing to take me in.’

Libby couldn’t hide her horror. ‘I can’t imagine …’

‘Good. I’m glad you can’t—that is how it should be.’

Libby’s thoughts raced. ‘If I take this, does that mean that my internship is ended?’

‘Do you think you have anything more to learn?’

‘Of course I do!’

‘Then I suggest you stay until you have learnt all the skills you require.’

Libby had no idea if he was talking bed or boardroom, she was just relieved that this wasn’t ending.

It was not yet nine when his early breakfast meeting wound down. Rafael set off on foot to make his way back to the office. He was within a few hundred yards of the building when he spotted her, the brightness of her hair catching his eye, the slim curviness of her figure holding it.

He changed direction and followed her, watching as she walked into the coffee bar. He watched
through the window as she headed for an empty table and took her place in the rush-hour queue.

His mood lifted at the thought of joining her. He was about to do just that when he saw a man join her. Tall and fair-haired, he bent forward speaking to her, smiling.

A chat-up line, Rafael thought, waiting with a smile to see Libby send him packing. Only she didn’t. She smiled and started chatting to him.

Rafael stood there and swore, fighting the instincts that told him to walk in there and drag the young man out.

The thought of Libby’s reaction to that made his lips twitch into a reluctant smile—that would go down almost as well as chest-banging or putting an ad in a national daily announcing to the world at large that this was his woman.

Except she wasn’t. They had an understanding and there was nothing in this understanding that specifically stated they were exclusive—he had just assumed.

He shook his head. He was acting as though she were
kissing the guy, not passing time with her neighbour in a queue.

Rafael did not know what was wrong with him.

He was living the dream; he was enjoying the best sex of his life. He had a beautiful woman in his bed, a woman who made him laugh with no complications.

And there, he realized, lay the source of his dissatisfaction. His nostrils flared as he forced himself to follow the train of thought through.

He wanted complications.

It was a staggering discovery.

‘G
RETCHEN
?’

His PA lifted her head, saw her boss standing there and put the phone down with a rueful sigh. ‘All right, I admit it was a personal call.’

‘Cara?’

Gretchen nodded, encouraged by the relatively mellow response. ‘Yes, it was. She needs cheering up.’

‘She works at Me ltons, doesn’t she?’

His PA nodded. ‘Worked.’

‘I did wonder when I heard they were shedding that many jobs. So she’s job hunting … how’s it going?’ Rafael was not surprised when his secretary shrugged and said gloomily, ‘Not well, a trillion applications and so far nothing. If Cara with her qualifications can’t get a job what chance do other people have?’

‘Her expertise is IT, isn’t it?’

Gretchen nodded. ‘She graduated top of her class. She’s brilliant or, to put it in the words of the places she applied to, over-qualified. Talk about catch-22.’

‘We are expanding our IT division.’

‘Yeah, I know. I sent out the job ad to the dailies.’

‘Has Cara thought of applying? I’m not making any promises but—’

So astonished she knocked her neatly arranged row
of ballpoint pens onto the floor, Gretchen cut across him. ‘You’re not sacking me, are you?’

Rafael angled an impatient look at her bent head. He knew better than to continue until she had rearranged her pens to her satisfaction. ‘No, I’m not sacking you.’

‘Just checking. So what about the no-romantic-involvements-in-the-workplace rule?’

‘It is possible that I might be relaxing that rule,’ Rafael conceded.

A slow smile spread across his PA’s face as she looked at him closely. ‘If I didn’t know better I’d say that was a blush.’

Rafael’s white grin flashed. ‘Do not push it, Gretchen,’ he growled.

Gretchen, one eye on the geometric precision of the pads on her desk, grinned. ‘I’ll pass on the message to Cara, though I do have one worry.’

Rafael arched a questioning brow.

‘As you know, Cara is a redhead and I’m a bit worried given your weakness—’

Rafael could hear her throaty chuckle as he walked down the corridor. He smiled all the way to the park where he knew that Libby ate her sandwich before he lost his nerve. Libby was not alone or eating, she was standing under the large horse-chestnut tree surrounded by her father and what he presumed was the rest of her family.

He moved off at a tangent, walking along the line of trees until he was in earshot.

It was Kate Marchant who was speaking.

‘So it’s true, then—you’re not trying to deny it. You are sleeping with Alejandro. You’re his mistress. When Rachel said she’d seen you going into his flat I felt as if—’

From where he stood Rafael saw Libby shake her head; he could not see her face or read her expression but he had no trouble hearing her response.

‘No, I’m not denying it, Mum. Please,’ she begged. ‘Don’t cry.’

‘Cry? What do you expect her to do? Cheer?’ her brother cried. ‘Libby, that man—how could you? After what happened to Meg. Have you lost your mind?’

‘What happened to Meg was not Rafael’s fault.’

‘So you’re saying it was my fault!’ her brother flared back.

Well aware that no matter what he said her brother blamed himself for allowing Meg to travel, Libby reached out to squeeze her brother’s arm. ‘I’m not saying it was anyone’s fault—’ Tears of hurt sprang to her eyes when Ed flinched away as though her touch were poison.

Her father shook his head. ‘How could you betray us this way with the man who ruined me?’

‘You’re not ruined. With the rescue package everyone keeps their jobs and you keep the house.’

‘And you expect me to be grateful.’

Libby looked at her father and thought, Yes, actually, I do.

‘We are
allowed
to stay in the house like tenants in our own home, reliant on the charity of that man!’

‘I know it’s tough, but—!’

‘You know nothing, Libby. This so-called rescue package—haven’t you realised that’s just a front?’

‘A front?’ Libby was mystified by the comment.

‘A smokescreen. This isn’t about charity. He jumped in with both feet wielding an axe. He can’t admit he was wrong so he comes up with this
rescue package
fooling gullible people like you into thinking he’s some sort of
hero when in actual fact he doesn’t have a clue what he’s talking about.’

As she listened to the rant Libby felt growing anger. Did her father actually
believe
the stuff he was spouting?

‘A man like that doesn’t do anything unless there’s a profit in it.’

Libby bit her lip and struggled to stay calm. ‘Look, Dad, I don’t want to hurt any of you.’ Her heart sank as she searched their faces, recognising that her words were falling on deaf ears. It wouldn’t matter what she said; their minds were closed to anything she said.

This ambush was not about listening to her explanations. They wanted remorse, they wanted penitence, and Libby knew she could give neither.

A fortnight ago, a week even, her reaction might have been different, but not now.

Now she would not apologise, she would not allow anyone to turn what she had with Rafael into anything sordid and she would not be party to any character assassination. She had made Rafael the scapegoat, blamed him for everything, but now she knew differently.

‘Not want to hurt us?’ Kate Marchant echoed, looking at her daughter with a coldness that hurt Libby more than she had imagined possible. ‘Then you have a strange way of showing it!’

‘Mum, please …’

Rafael took a step forward; the anguish in her voice felt like a blade sliding between his ribs. She looked so alone standing there that the need to protect her was too strong to resist.

‘At least say you’re ashamed of your dirty secret. That you’re ashamed you betrayed your family.’

The words brought Rafael to a halt. Fists clenched at his sides, he waited for her reply.

‘Leave her, Ed, it’s not her fault. It is that man,’ Kate Marchant cut in. ‘He poisons everything he touches.’

‘Yes, I am ashamed.’

The blood drained from Rafael’s face. It was no more than he expected, he told himself. Why should it hurt? He had been rejected before and survived.

Libby lifted her chin proudly. ‘I’m ashamed that I ever was ashamed. I’m ashamed that I asked Rafael to keep our affair a secret. I’m not ashamed now, I’m proud. He deserves a lot better, a lot better than me. None of those things that you think about him are true. He’s an incredible person, he’s overcome so many things and … the people who work for him—do you think it’s accidental that they’d do anything for him? Go see for yourselves. You won’t hear anyone say a bad word about him, not the ones that know him.’

‘Do you think it’s possible that they’re worried this saint might sack them?’ Ed asked drily. He gave a snort of disgust and shook his head.

Her family stared in varying degrees of horror as she maintained her defiant stance.

‘Look what he did to your father, Libby,’ Kate Marchant inserted. ‘You know what sort of man he is.’

‘Grow up, Libby,’ her brother advised harshly. ‘The man’s having sex with you, of course he won’t let you see his vicious side, but once he’s got tired of you just wait and see how nice he is then.’

He turned to their parents and pointed a finger towards Libby. ‘The man has brainwashed her.’

‘No, Ed, he’s not brainwashed me.’

‘This has got to stop now,’ her father said sternly.
‘You have to promise us that you never see this man again.’

‘Don’t ask me to choose between him and you, Dad,’ Libby pleaded.

Rafael watched. Taking a knife to the heart would have been easier than watching her pain.

Her family began to move away together, turning away from her, offering one another the support they had denied Libby. As much as he despised their actions today he knew that he would have to put personal feelings aside to make this thing right.

‘I brought lunch but I see you’ve already eaten.’

Libby stared at the tall figure who stepped out from the shadow of a tree, a lunch bag rather improbably swinging in his hand. Her immediate impulse was to walk straight into his arms. There were several flaws in this plan, not least the possibility they would not open wide to enfold her the way they did in the scene playing in her head, so she fought the impulse and stayed where she was.

‘Since when did you take alfresco lunches?’

‘I’m always open to new experiences, embrace them even.’ He glanced at the bag in his hand. ‘This represents quite a big new experience for me.’

Libby barely registered the odd inflection in his voice; she had to know. She jerked her head towards the now empty bench where sparrows were dive-bombing the remains of her own forgotten
lunch.

‘You heard that, didn’t you?’

Rafael swallowed and nodded.

Libby loosed a mortified groan and dropped her chin into her chest. ‘You weren’t meant to,’ she mumbled miserably.

‘I can’t be the cause of a rift between you and your parents, Libby.’

She gave a teary smile but there was an air of finality to Libby’s response. ‘You can’t stop me, Rafael, unless you are saying you want this … us to stop.’

‘Families are important.’ She had something that he did not; he could not let her throw it away.