A Game of Vows
“Is it mercenary to try and improve the quality of your life?” she asked.
“It depends on the route you take.”
“And the resources available to you are a major factor in deciding which route to take,” she said.
“I’m not judging you, Hannah, believe it or not.”
She planted her hands on her hips. “No, you’re just using me.”
“As you said, you do what you must to improve the quality of your life.” His expression was strange, tense. Dark.
She looked away. “I have to do something.”
“What is that?”
She looked down at her left hand, at the massive, sparkly engagement ring Zack had given her a few months earlier. She tugged it off her finger, a strange sensation moving through her like a strong wind. Sadness. Regret. Relief.
“I have to send this to Zack.” She held it up and realized her hands were shaking. She couldn’t keep it. Not for another second. Because mercenary she might be. But she wasn’t a thief. She wouldn’t take from Zack. Wouldn’t do any more damage than she’d already done.
“I can have someone do that for you. Do you know where he is?”
“Thailand,” she said, without missing a beat. “We were supposed to honeymoon there.”
“And you think he went?” he asked, dark eyebrows raised.
She smiled. “Zack had business in Thailand, so yes, I think he went. No, I know he went. He’s not the kind of man to let a little thing like an interrupted marriage keep him from accomplishing his goals.”
Eduardo studied her, dark eyes intense. “Perhaps he was perfect for you.”
“Yeah, well, I’m trying not to dwell on that.” She held the ring out and Eduardo opened his hand. She dropped it into his palm. “I have the address of the place we were meant to stay at.”
“Bien. I’ll call a courier and have it rushed.” He closed his hand around the ring, the glittering gem disappearing. All she could think of was that he held her future in his hand. The future that might have been. The one that was not eclipsed by Eduardo.
She looked up, their eyes clashing. Her throat tightened, halting her breath.
“Good,” she said, barely able to force out the words. She turned to the desk and saw a pad and pen slotted into the wooden slats built into it for organization. It was where she’d kept them when she’d lived here. She bent and scribbled the address for the house she should be in now, with Zack.
Her fingers felt stiff and cold around the pen. She straightened and handed him the note. “There. That should do it.”
“I’m surprised you don’t want to keep the ring.”
“Why? I didn’t keep the one you gave me, either.”
“We had a prior agreement. I get the feeling you didn’t have an agreement like that with him.”
“Separate beds, separate lives, unless a public appearance is needed? No. We were meant to be married for real.” She swallowed hard. “And all things considered, I don’t feel right keeping his ring. I was the one who wronged him.”
“Careful, Hannah, I might start thinking you grew a conscience in our time apart.”
“I’ve always had one,” she said. “It’s been inconvenient sometimes.”
“Not too inconvenient.”
“Oh, what would you know about a conscience, Eduardo?”
“Very little. Only that it occasionally takes the form of a cricket.”
A reluctant laugh escaped her lips. “That sounds about right. So … if you could mail my ring to him, that would be great.”
“I’ll call now.” He turned and walked out of the room, leaving her alone.
She sat on the edge of the bed, her emotions a blank. She wasn’t sure what she was supposed to feel. Why she suddenly felt more relieved than upset about leaving Zack behind. Marriage to him would have been good.
And yet, when she thought of the honeymoon, when she thought of sharing his bed … she couldn’t make the man in her vision Zack.
The man she saw was darker, more intense. The man she saw was Eduardo. His hands on her skin, his lips on her throat …
She flopped backward and covered her face with her hands. “Stop it,” she admonished herself. She rolled onto her side and grabbed a pillow, hugging it tightly to her chest. She hadn’t done that since high school. Comforting then, even when the world was crumbling around her, and just as comforting now.
Eduardo had always been handsome. He’d always appealed to her. That was nothing new. But she’d never once been tempted to act on any kind of attraction while they’d lived together. It hadn’t been part of her plan. And she didn’t deviate from her plans. Plans, control, being the one in charge of her life, that was everything. The most important thing.
Not Eduardo’s handsome face and sexy physique.
“Feeling all right?” Eduardo asked from the doorway.
She snapped back into a sitting position, pillow still locked tightly against her breasts. “Fine.”
Eduardo couldn’t hold back the smile that tugged at the corner of his lips. Hannah Weston, flopped on her bed like a teenage girl. A show of softness, a show of humanity, he hadn’t expected from an ice queen like her. Like her reaction when he mentioned her fiancé. Like when she’d given back the other man’s ring.
It suited him to think of Hannah as being above human emotion. It always had. He needed her. He didn’t know all the reasons why, but he did. And that meant it was easier to believe that she would simply go with the option that benefited her most and feel no regret over leaving the inferior choice behind.
But that wasn’t how she was behaving. And it gave him a strange twinge in his chest that seemed completely foreign.
Hannah stood up from the bed and put the pillow gingerly back in its place. She cleared her throat and straightened. She looked … soft for a moment. Different than he’d ever seen her before. She was beautiful, no question, more so now than she’d been as a too-thin college student.
She was still thin, but her angles had softened into curves, her cheekbones less sharp, her breasts small but round.
Instantly, an image of him pushing her on the bed, tugging her shirt up, filled his mind. He could take those breasts into his hands … suck her nipple between his lips, his teeth …
A rush of blood roared through his body, south of his belt. How long had it been since that had happened? Since he’d been aroused by an actual woman. In solitude, with a fantasy, he could certainly find release. But with a woman? One he had to somehow seduce and charm when he had no more seduction and charm left in him? That had been beyond him for quite some time.
“I can see that. You epitomize ‘fine.’”
“I’m ready to find out what your game plan is, Vega,” she said, crossing her arms beneath those small, gorgeous breasts.
“My game plan?”
“Yes. I don’t like not knowing the score. I want to know exactly what you have planned and why.”
“Tomorrow, I plan to take you to the office, to let you look at things and get a feel for the state of the company.”
“All right. What else?”
He felt the need to goad her. To shake her icy composure. As she was shaking his. He took a step forward, extended his hand and brushed his knuckles over her cheek. Her skin was like a rose petal, soft and delicate. “Well, tonight, my darling bride, we dine out.” Her eyes darkened, blush-pink lips parting. She was not unaffected by him. His body celebrated the victory even as his mind reminded him that this had no place in their arrangement. “I intend to show all of Barcelona that Señora Vega has returned to her husband.”
CHAPTER THREE
GLAMOROUS events and upscale restaurants had become typical in Hannah’s world over the past five years. But going with Eduardo wasn’t.
The car ride to La Playa had been awkward. She’d dressed impeccably for the evening, as she always did, her blond hair twisted into a bun, her lips and dress a deep berry color, perfect for her complexion.
Eduardo was perfectly pressed as always in a dark suit he’d left unbuttoned and a white shirt with an unfastened collar.
All of that was as it should be. The thing that bothered her was the tension between them. It wasn’t just anger, and heaven knew she should feel a whole lot of anger, but there was something else. Something darker and infinitely more powerful.
Something that had changed. It was directly linked to the change in Eduardo, the dark, enticing intensity that lived in him now. The thing she couldn’t define.
The thing that made her shake inside.
Eduardo maneuvered the car up the curb and killed the engine. She opened the door and was out and halfway around the car when she nearly ran into him. Her heart stalled, her breath rushing out of her.
“I would have opened your door for you,” he said.
She inhaled sharply, trying to collect herself. “And I didn’t need you to.”
“You’re my wife, querida, here to reconcile with me. Don’t you think I would show you some chivalry?”
“Again with the chivalry. I thought you and I established that honor wasn’t our strong point.”
“But it will be as far as the press is concerned. Or, more to the point, our relationship needs to seem like a strength.” He leaned forward and brushed his knuckles gently over her cheekbone, just as he’d done back in the penthouse.
And just as it had done back at the penthouse, her blood pressure spiked, her heartbeat raging out of control.
She’d had a connection with Zack, and certainly physical attraction. They hadn’t slept together, but they’d kissed. Quite a bit. Enough to know that they had chemistry. Now the idea of what she’d shared with Zack being chemistry seemed like a joke.
It had been easy to kiss Zack and say good-night. To walk away. His lips on hers only made her lips burn.
A look from Eduardo made her burn. Everywhere.
She’d lived with him before, though, and nothing had happened between them. There was no reason to think she couldn’t keep a handle on it this time.
She turned her face away from him, the night air hitting her cheek, feeling especially cold with the loss of his skin against hers.
He cupped her chin with his thumb and forefinger, turning her face so that she had to look at him. “You can’t act like my touch offends you.”
“I’m not,” she said, holding her breath as she took a step closer to him, as she slid her hand down his arm and laced her fingers with his. “See?”
She was sure he could hear her heart pounding, was certain he knew just how he was affecting her. Except … he wasn’t gloating. He wasn’t poised to give her a witty comeback, or make fun of her.
“You seem so different,” she said, following him to where the valet was standing. He ignored her statement and gave his keys to the young man in the black vest, speaking to him in Spanish, his focus determinedly off Hannah, even while he held on to her hand.
He tightened his grip on her as they walked on the cobblestones, to the front of the restaurant. It was an old building, brick, the exterior showing the age and character of Barcelona. But inside, it had been transformed. Sleek, sophisticated and smelling nearly as strongly of money as it did of paella, it was exactly the kind of place she’d imagined Eduardo would like.
It was exactly the kind of place she liked.
A man dressed all in black was waiting at the front. His face lit with recognition when Eduardo walked in. “Señor Vega, a table for you and your guest?”
“Sí,” he said. “This is Señora Vega, my wife. She’s come back to Barcelona. I’m very … pleased to see her.” He turned to the side, brushing her hair off her face. Heat sparked, from there down through her body. She tried to keep smiling.
The man cocked his head to the side, clearly pleased to be let in on such exclusive news. “Bienvenido a Barcelona, señora. We’re glad to have you back.”
She could feel Eduardo’s gaze on her, feel his hold tighten on her waist. She forced her smile wider. “I’m very glad to be back.”
“Bien. Right this way.”
He led them to a table in the back of the room, white and glossy, with bright red bench seats on either side of it. There was a stark white curtain shielding part of the seating area from view, giving an air of seclusion and luxury.
Eduardo spoke to their host in Spanish for a moment before the other man left and Eduardo swept the curtain aside, holding it open for her. She looked at him, the smile still glued on her face. “Thank you.”
Back when they’d been married, they might have gone to a place like this late on a Saturday night. And everyone inside would know Eduardo. Would clamor for his attention. And she would play her part, smiling and nodding while mentally trying to decide what appetizer to get.
There was none of that tonight. If people had looked at them, it had been subtle. And no one spoke to Eduardo. No one stopped to ask about business. Or where the next big party was. Or which nightclub was opening soon.
She looked behind them and saw that people were staring. Trying to be covert, but not doing a good job. Their expressions weren’t welcoming. They looked … They looked either afraid or like they were looking at a car crash and she couldn’t figure out why.
“You play your part very well,” Eduardo said, not paying any attention to the other diners, “but then, you always did.”
“I know,” she said. She played every part well. A girl from the Southern United States with bad grades, a thick-as-molasses accent and a total lack of sophistication had to work hard to fit in with the university crowd in Barcelona. But she’d done it.
She’d dropped most of her accent, studied twice as hard as anyone else, and perfected an expression of boredom that carried her through posh events and busy cities without ever looking like the country mouse she was.
It was only when she was alone that she gave herself freedom to luxuriate in comfortable sheets and room service, and all of the other things her new life had opened up to her.
“And you’re never modest, which, I confess, I quite like,” he said. “Why should you be? You’ve achieved a great a deal. And you’ve done it on your own.”
“Is this the part where you try and make friends with me?” she asked.
He laughed, a sort of strained, forced sound, nothing like the laugh he’d once had. It had been joyous, easy. Now he sounded out of practice. “Don’t be silly, why would I do that?”
“No reason, I suppose. You never did try to be my friend. Just my fake husband.”
“Your real husband,” he corrected. “Ours just hasn’t been a traditional marriage.”
“Uh, no. Starting with you calling me into your office one day and telling me you knew all my secrets and that, unless I wanted them spilled, I would do just as you asked me.”
A waiter came by and Eduardo ordered a pre fixe meal. Hannah read the description in the gilded menu and her stomach cramped with hunger. She was thin—she always had been—but it had more to do with her metabolism than watching her diet. Food was very important to her.
When the waiter had gone, she studied Eduardo’s face again. “Why did you do that? Why did you think it would be so … funny to marry me?”
He shook his head. “Very hard to say at this point in time. Everything was a joke to me. And I felt manipulated. I resented my father’s heavy hand in my life and I thought I would play his game against him.”
“And you used me.”
He met her eyes, unflinching. “I did.”
“Why?”
He looked down, a strange expression on his face. “Because I could. Because I was Eduardo Vega. Everything, and everyone, in my life existed to please me. My father wanted to see me be a man. He wanted to see me assume control. Find a wife, a family to care for. To give of myself instead of just take. I thought him a foolish, backward old man.”
“So you married someone you knew he would find unsuitable.”
“I did.” He looked up at her. “I would not do so now.”
She studied him more closely, the hardened lines on his face, the weariness in his eyes. “You seem different,” she said, finally voicing it.
“How so?” he asked.
“Older.”
“I am older.”
“But more than five years older,” she said, looking at the lines around his mouth. Mostly though, it was the endless darkness in his eyes.
“You flatter me.”
“You know I would never flatter you, Eduardo. I would never flatter anyone.”
A strange expression crossed his face. “No, you wouldn’t. But I suppose, ironically, that proves you an honest person in your way.”
“I suppose.” She looked down at the table. “Has your father’s death been hard on you?”
“Of course. And for my mother it has been … nearly unendurable. She has loved him, only him, since she was a teenager. She’s heartbroken.”
Hannah frowned, picturing Carmela Vega. She had been such a sweet, solid presence. She’d invited Eduardo and Hannah to dinner every Sunday night during their marriage. She’d forced Hannah to know them. To love them.
More people that Hannah had hurt in order to protect herself.
“I’m very sorry about that.”
“As am I.” He hesitated a moment. “I am doing my best to take care of things. To take care of her. There is something you should know. Something you will know if you’re going to spend any amount of time around me.”
Anticipation, trepidation, crept over her. He sounded grave, intense, two things Eduardo had never been when she’d known him. “And that is?” she asked, trying to keep her tone casual.
Eduardo wished the waiter had poured them wine. He would have a word with the manager about the server after their meal.
Before he could answer Hannah’s question, their waiter appeared, with wine and mussels in clarified butter. He set them on the table and Eduardo picked up the glass, taking a long drink.
When the waiter left again, he set it on the table, his focus back on Hannah, his resolve strengthened.
“I was involved in an accident, very soon after you left.”
“An accident?”
“At my family’s stables. I was jumping my horse in a course I had ridden hundreds of times. The horse came to a jump he’d done before, but he balked. I was thrown.” That much, he had been told by others later. It was strange how vividly he remembered the moments leading up to the accident. The smell of the dirt, grass and the sweat of the horses. He could remember mounting his horse and coaxing him into a trot, then a canter. He could remember nothing after that. Nothing for days and days after. They were gone. “I wasn’t wearing a helmet. My head hit the edge of the jump, then the ground.” The regret of that burned in him still. It had been a simple thing, a commonplace activity, and it had changed his life forever. “It’s funny, because you see, I did forget to file the divorce papers.”
Hannah looked pale, her cheeks the color of wax, her lips holding barely a blush of rose. For the first time since he’d known her, she looked truly shaken. “It doesn’t sound funny.”
“You can laugh at it, querida. I don’t mind.”
“I do. I mind, Eduardo. How badly were you hurt?”
He shook his head. “Badly enough. There has been … damage.” He hated to speak of it. Hated to voice the lasting problems the accident had caused. It made them seem real. Final. He didn’t want them. Five years later and he couldn’t believe he was trapped with a mind that betrayed him as his did.
“I have issues with my memory,” he said. “My attention span. Frequent migraines. And I have had some changes in my personality. At least I’ve been told so. It’s hard for me to truly … remember or understand the man I was before.”
He looked at her face, stricken, pained. Strange to see her that way. She had always been as cool and steady as a block of ice. Even when he’d called her into his office all those years ago to tell her he’d discovered she’d faked her paperwork to get into college, she’d been stoic. Angry, but poised.
With a calm that women twice her age couldn’t have affected, she’d agreed to his foolish marriage scheme. It seemed foolish to him now, anyway. He’d been such a stupid boy, full of his own importance, laughing at life.
Yes, he certainly had changed.
Even now, sitting across from Hannah, as he had done that day he’d coerced her into marriage, he couldn’t understand the man that he’d been. Couldn’t understand why it had been so amusing. Why he had felt entitled to drag her into his game.
He had been convinced that being near her would …
“I noticed,” she said, her voice soft.
“I suppose you did.” He lifted his wineglass to his lips again, trying to ignore the defeat that came when the crisp flavor hit his tongue. Wine didn’t even make him feel the same. It used to make him feel lighter, a bit happier. Now it just made him tired. “It is of no consequence. With the changes came no desire for me to change back.” It wasn’t true, not entirely, but he was hardly going to give her reason to pity him. He could take a great many things, but not pity.
“Is this why you’re having problems with Vega?” she asked.
“Essentially.” The word burned. “I had someone hired to …” He chose his words carefully. He disliked the word help almost as much as he disliked saying he couldn’t do something. Of course, the verbal avoidance game was empty, because it didn’t change reality. “To oversee the duties of managing finances and budgets. Someone else to do taxes. Neither did an adequate job, and now I find myself with some issues to work out, and no one that I trust to handle it.”
“And you trust me?” Her tone was incredulous, blue eyes round.
“I don’t know that I trust you, but I do know your deepest and darkest secrets. In the absence of trust, I consider it a fairly hefty insurance policy.”
She took another sip of her wine. “There are some things about you that are still the same,” she said.
“What things?” he asked, desperate to know.
For a moment, she felt like the lifeline he’d built her up to be. No one else seemed to see anything in him from before. They saw him as either diminished in some way, or frightening. His mother and sister, loving as ever, seemed to pity him. He felt smothered in it.
“You’re still incredibly amused by what you perceive to be your own brilliance.”
Unbidden, a laugh escaped his lips. “If a man can’t find amusement with himself, life could become boring.”
“A double entendre?” She arched her brow.
“No, I’m afraid not. Further evidence of the changes in me, I suppose.” And yet with Hannah, sometimes he felt normal. Something akin to what and who he had been. It felt good to exchange banter, to have her face him, an almost-friendly adversary. For the moment.
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