CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FOUR
G AbrIELA HAD OUTDONE HERS ELF , Mia thought, as she came into the dining room with its cherry-wood table that seated twelve and matching chairs with cushions of cream leather. Built-in cabinets of glossy wood housed a set of expensive-looking porcelain, with Aguila’s eagle crest and trademark stripes of gold and grey.
On one end of the long table, several dishes had been laid out—the typical tapas of Seville including Iberian ham, manzanilla olives, spinach and chickpea tapenade and pork in whiskey sauce. There was also a bowl of ripe, succulent fruit, as well as freshly baked bread and a round of Manchego cheese. Two place settings had been laid, complete with crystal glasses and linen napkins, the chairs perpendicular to each other.
It was a cosy, inviting spot. Santos, chivalrous as ever, pulled out the chair at the end of the table for her. With murmured thanks, Mia sat down. She was trying not to freak out about the thought of talking about everything. Surely he hadn’t actually meant it? He’d never wanted to before...and neither had she.
He sat down in the seat perpendicular to her, close enough that his knee nudged hers, and the warmth of his leg against hers was enough to send her heart rate skittering as awareness rippled along her skin. Had he done it deliberately? He didn’t seem bothered by the contact, but Mia was. Everything about this experience was making her feel uneasy and anxious, as well as hyper-sensitive, as if her nerves were being scraped raw. She couldn’t handle being so close to this man, not with so many memories between them—the beautiful, bittersweet ones, and the painful ones that still caused her shudders of agony. The sooner they agreed to go their separate ways, the better. She wasn’t sure she could survive much more.
Santos, as relaxed as ever, held up the platter of pork. ‘May I serve you?’
Mia hadn’t eaten all that much since she’d boarded the yacht and, while she was hungry, she wasn’t sure she could manage so much as a mouthful right now. But she forced a nod. ‘Just a little, please.’
She watched as Santos loaded up both their plates with various delicacies. There was a bottle of white Rioja chilling in a bucket of ice next to the table, and he took it and poured them both a glass. It was all so very civilised, she thought as he lifted his glass.
‘Arriba, abajo, al centro y pa’ dentro!’ he proclaimed, reciting the old Spanish toast. You are never above me, never below me, never away from me and always with me.
Was that a warning, Mia wondered as she drank, or a promise?
‘So,’ Santos said after he’d set down his glass and leaned back in his chair, steepling his fingers together like a professor. ‘In answer to your question, do I think our marriage was a mistake...?’
He paused and Mia tensed. She realised, in that moment, she didn’t actually want him to think that at all, which had to be phenomenally stupid. She thought it was a mistake and of course he should as well. It would make everything easier if he did.
‘The answer is twofold,’ he continued in that calm voice, as smooth as a river of honey rolling right over her. ‘First, I don’t think that, but second, it doesn’t matter—even if I did, we are still married, and should therefore honour our vows.’
Mia carefully set down her glass. ‘Putting the second point aside for the moment,’ she replied as mildly as she could, ‘Why don’t you think that?’
Santos gazed at her thoughtfully, his head cocked to the side. It felt as if he were trying to plumb the depths of her soul, and it took all of Mia’s strength simply to sit there, a faint, enquiring smile on her face, and wait. ‘I suppose,’ he answered after a moment, ‘The question really is, why do you?’
She let out a small, hollow laugh. He was deflecting, the way she often did, another aspect of her mother’s ‘don’t let anyone close’ philosophy, don’t actually ever admit what she was thinking or what she cared about—who she was . And yet, what was the point of this conversation, its discomfort, if she didn’t tell the truth—or at least a bit of it?
‘I suppose,’ she answered slowly, toying with the fragile stem of her wine glass, ‘Because we’re so different. And we want different things out life.’
‘I can certainly agree with the first point,’ Santos replied with a smile, his teeth gleaming whitely in his tanned face. After the carefully leashed fury of that first night, he seemed remarkably at ease now. Why? What had changed? ‘As to the second...what do you want out of life, Mia? Truly?’
Startled, she lifted her glass and took a sip of wine as she attempted to organise her thoughts. What did she want out of life? ‘Safety’ was the first word that came to mind, but she discarded it because she already knew Santos would insist he could make her safe—more than anyone else, with his money, his power and his high-walled estate locking everything and everyone out if he so chose.
But that wasn’t the kind of safety she meant. Physical safety and emotional safety were two very different things. As a child, she’d known far too well what it was like to have neither—she’d hid under her covers, listening to her mother and her drunken friends in the next room. The two of them would have to run from yet another commune, farm or shabby flat because once again it had all gone wrong... Her childhood had been a tempestuous sea of instability, and she’d been tossed on its waves over and over again.
Santos had made her feel safe, back at the beginning, in both ways. It was what had compelled her to agree to his unexpected and reckless proposal of marriage. She’d trusted him at the start, and she wasn’t someone who gave her trust away easily. How had it all gone so wrong, so quickly? And was there any way to make it right again? Santos seemed to think there was, but Mia felt too jaded to share that hope.
‘Freedom,’ she finally said, because hadn’t she learned that was what emotional safety essentially was—never letting anyone close enough to hurt her? Going her own way as a choice rather than default or rejection?
‘Freedom,’ he repeated slowly. His eyes had narrowed, but his tone was mild. ‘What kind of freedom, exactly?’
Mia shrugged restively, not wanting to give much more away. ‘Just...being free. Making my own choices, being able to do what I want.’ Which made her sound a bit selfish, she realised, and it wasn’t really about that at all. It was about not being hurt—not able to be hurt. But she didn’t know how to explain that and, even if she did, she wasn’t sure she wanted to. Actually, she knew she didn’t want to...but then maybe this conversation was pointless.
A sigh escaped her at the thought, and she reached for an olive from her plate, nibbling its tart saltiness. ‘Anyway, it’s the first point that’s more relevant, Santos,’ she replied with clear deflection. ‘We’re simply too different.’
He leaned back, steepling his fingers together again. ‘Don’t they say opposites attract?’ He smiled faintly as he cocked his head and waited for her reply.
‘Attract, yes,’ she allowed. They’d certainly been attracted to each other They’d left the bar the first night they’d met and gone right to Santos’s five-star hotel. There had been no discussion, no question about any of it. Mia remembered soaring up in the lift to dizzying heights, her heart racing in time with it. Santos’s slow, sure smile as he’d reached for her hand... And, when he’d kissed her for the first time, it had felt as if fireworks had gone off inside her head, her heart.
She’d never been one for flings, and had never had a one-night stand, because she hadn’t wanted to give that much of herself away so cheaply. Yet she’d had no doubts about being with Santos, about it feeling and being right. At least, not until much later.
‘Whether opposites can stay together is another matter,’ she finished, and then popped the olive into her mouth, forcing herself to swallow, for her throat suddenly felt dry as Santos’s eyes narrowed in speculation.
‘I suppose it takes more effort,’ he remarked slowly. ‘To understand where the other person is coming from.’
Effort, Mia supposed, that neither of them had really made. Their attraction had been so wonderfully easy, and she’d assumed—maybe they both had—that the rest would be too. The first bump in the road that they’d come to—and admittedly it had been a big one, very early on—had utterly derailed the whole thing. It had been hard, if not impossible, to recover from that.
‘I suppose any marriage is hard work,’ she replied, meaning it to be more of a generic observation than an assessment of their own unfortunate nuptial state.
Santos leaned forward, his eyes firing to bronze. ‘Then let’s put in the work, Mia.’
She’d walked right into that one, Mia realised, but even so she was surprised. Santos certainly hadn’t seemed to want to put in the work before. Did she even want him to now? Did he , really? Was it worth it? She didn’t think could take any more heartbreak, any more guilt .
She definitely knew she couldn’t stand Santos looking at her the way he had in the hospital, when their baby had bled out of her, as if she’d committed a crime.
‘What would the point be, Santos?’ she asked finally, her tone weary. ‘We’ve already seen we don’t work together.’ For six excruciating weeks after her miscarriage.
‘We worked very well together at the beginning.’ His voice had dropped to a husky murmur, laced with meaningful innuendo, his gaze darkening as his eyes bored into hers, forcing her to remember. And in truth, it didn’t take much to catapult Mia right back to those first few, heady days and weeks—to the joy and pleasure of discovering each other’s bodies, revelling in the way they’d seemed to connect not just physically, but emotionally, utterly at ease in each other’s company in a way she’d never experienced before. But none of it had lasted.
‘Yes, at the beginning,’ she agreed, her voice wavering as heat flooded her body along with the memories—Santos, his lips on her throat, his hands anchoring her hips as he trailed kisses down her body. Memories of her head thrown back, her body thrumming with pleasure, never having known it could be like that between a man and a woman.
‘Plenty of people have that, Santos,’ she continued, managing to make her voice stronger. ‘It’s called infatuation.’ She forced herself to face him down, quailing at the blaze in his eyes, a potent mix of fury and desire, as she basically reduced their relationship to something shallow and tawdry. But she had to, to make him let her go. She finished as she reached for another olive, ‘It was just a fling.’
Just a fling? Just a fling?
Santos felt a righteous rage roar through him, a tidal wave that hid the underlying surge of hurt. Was she reducing the most important relationship he’d ever had to schoolboy emotion, a sordid affair? Yes, it had been swift, intense and overwhelming—he could certainly grant all that—but it hadn’t been a fling . He didn’t even have flings; he knew plenty of men did, especially ones with money and power, but he’d always seen casual sexual relationships as a distasteful abuse of his position. He’d been selective with his partners, and had made sure they meant something.
Even though Mia had been different—and, yes, it had all happened so fast—he had never, not even in the first wild, heady throes of passion, thought that what they had wasn’t real. Even later, when he’d had cause, so much cause, to doubt, he’d done his best to keep himself from it. He’d done his best to believe that Mia was a good person, the woman he’d thought she was, even when it had been damned near impossible. Even when she’d left. Even when he’d found her in a bar, looking as if she was living it up in his absence.
And he was here now, wasn’t he? Still trying to believe the best of her against all odds. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. He eased back in his chair and took a sip of wine to calm the raging emotion he normally didn’t let himself feel.
An Aguila must always be master of his mind and his heart. He could hear his father saying that in his steady, commanding voice, and it gave him the level-headedness he needed. ‘So, why did you marry me, then, out of curiosity?’ he asked.
Mia looked startled by the question, then pensive as she considered her answer. ‘I suppose I got caught up in it all,’ she replied after a moment, her tone cautious as she nibbled her olive. ‘It was exciting, new...overwhelming. And you made me feel...’ She stopped suddenly and gave a little shrug. ‘I believed in it, in us , for a little while.’
Us. A concept that for her no longer seemed to exist. What had she been about to say? Santos wondered. What had he made her feel? He decided not to ask her now, when she seemed so reluctant to part with any information. ‘So you didn’t think it was just infatuation at the start,’ he stated.
Mia frowned, finishing her olive, and then she shook her head, her plait flying over her shoulder. ‘Well, it wasn’t love.’
She sounded so certain, he was perhaps more stung than he should have been. Could a person even love someone after just two weeks? And yet he’d felt as if he had, or something close to it. Maybe not love ...but happiness, excitement, wonder... Yes.
‘Why not?’ he asked. The two words came out like bullets, fast and hard. He was glad he was challenging her. Maybe this was the conversation they’d needed to have all along. ‘Why wasn’t it love, Mia?’
She stared at him, her lips parting soundlessly for a few seconds before she replied. ‘Santos, real love is something that roots down and grows. It’s not a spark that suddenly bursts into flame. You’re a reasonable man; you must know this. I’m sure you actually believe it yourself.’ She stared at him, her eyes wide and blue-green, as clear as the crystalline sea. ‘We didn’t know each other well enough to truly be in love.’
She was right, of course. They hadn’t. He did know that. He believed it; he’d even say so himself. So what exactly was he trying to prove now? Why did her telling him they’d never been in love annoy and, yes, hurt so much?
‘That’s where the work part comes in, doesn’t it?’ he remarked after a moment, feeling his way through the idea. ‘Love isn’t necessarily easy, Mia. Growing something takes time, effort, commitment. Making a marriage work is the same.’ But she had chosen not to put in the effort. She’d made that abundantly clear when she’d left.
‘What exactly are you saying?’ she asked. ‘You want to make this marriage work?’ She sounded so incredulous that he almost laughed, although in truth he was irritated by her disbelief.
‘Why do you think I came halfway across Spain and found you?’
‘Honestly, I don’t know. I’m not sure you do either.’ She gave him a shrewd look before she shook her head and sighed. ‘I didn’t think you would. I thought... I thought you’d be glad to see me gone, frankly.’
‘Well, I wasn’t,’ he replied shortly. He stayed tight-lipped after that, because he wasn’t going to go into how hurt and humiliated he’d felt, how rejected and lost when he’d seen the empty space next to him in the bed. He’d felt it in his soul when he’d realised she’d sneaked away without leaving so much as a note. She’d cared about him that little.
Yes, things had become hard between them, damnably hard. And they hadn’t dealt with any of it, not in a way that was helpful or reasonable. But he’d still thought they would get through it. He’d trusted her...at least, he’d tried ...but when she’d left the doubts had come like a flock of crows, nesting inside him, cawing their lies. He was here because he wanted to face down those doubts, prove that Mia was the woman he’d always thought she was. Prove that their marriage could work...if they just committed to it.
‘I suppose,’ Mia said slowly, sounding out the words as they came, ‘I thought that if you came and found me it would just be because of your reputation—the “an Aguila is a man of his word” thing—not because you actually wanted our marriage to work.’
So did she think he cared more for appearances than realities or relationships? All right, he supposed he could understand why she might think that, at least a little. He’d made it sound as if the only reason he’d come after her was because he was a man of his word, not because of any feelings . But surely he’d showed her that wasn’t the case, at least not entirely? Although in truth his feelings were as tangled up as hers seemed to be.
Santos slowly shook his head. ‘Mia, what’s the point of a marriage if it doesn’t work?’
‘What’s the point,’ Mia countered, sounding weary and despairing, ‘Of trying to make a marriage work that can’t ?’
Santos absorbed that proposition with a slow blink. ‘Why are you so sure ours can’t?’ he asked levelly. Part of him wanted to prove just how well they’d worked right there and then. It would be easy: he’d take her by the hand and draw her onto his lap; fasten his hands to her hips and let her feel how much he wanted her. And he would feel it in her as well—the shudder of her breath, the widening of her eyes, the way her lips would part as her gaze dropped to his mouth...
Desire fired through his blood, making his heart race and certain parts of him tighten. It would be so easy...but it would be wrong. This wasn’t about physical desire or sexual conquest. That was the one part of their relationship that had definitely worked all right. It was everything else that had been the problem.
Belatedly, his mind still fogged with desire, Santos realised how silent Mia had gone, how stricken she looked. The only sound was the purr of the yacht’s motor, the lap of the waves against its hull. Mia’s face was pale, her eyes dark and wide.
‘Mia?’ he pressed.
She shook her head and then rose from the table in one abrupt movement. Santos half-rose himself as he watched her walk to the corner of the room, her back to him and her head bowed as she wrapped her arms around herself, as if she had to hold herself together. He felt as if he’d missed a crucial moment of their conversation, an emotional turning point that had happened in a beat of silence when he’d been imagining her naked.
‘Mia,’ he said again, quietly.
‘I can’t do this,’ she whispered, her narrow back to him practically vibrating with tension. ‘I’m sorry. I just... I can’t. I can’t do this.’ She let out a gulping sound that, with a ripple of shock, Santos realised was her holding back a sob.
He straightened and took a step towards her. He wanted to take her in his arms, hold her, comfort her, but he had no idea what had just happened and, more importantly, why .
He’d asked her why she thought their marriage couldn’t work. She’d responded by having to hold back sobs. An unease rippled over his skin, clenching his gut. There could only be one reason why Mia was reacting like this, and it was the thing they’d done their utmost not to talk about, backing away every time they’d come close because it hurt too damned much. At least, it had hurt him. He had no idea how Mia felt about it; he didn’t want to know. It was the raw wound that still pulsed with pain and which he’d done his best to ignore. Stupid, really, but sometimes it was the only way to survive...even as he bled out.
‘Mia,’ he said again, and he took another step towards her, close enough so he could rest his hands on her shoulders, feel the warmth of her skin seep through his palms. She tensed beneath his touch but she didn’t move away. Another shudder went through her, and another gulping sob came out before she pressed her fist to her mouth. ‘Mia, talk to me,’ Santos said.
Mia was silent for a long moment, her whole body quivering. Then she shrugged off Santos’s hands, jerking away from him in one abrupt movement. He was still absorbing that as she whirled round and faced him with fury in her eyes.
‘All right, Santos,’ she said in a voice of cold, controlled anger. ‘Why are you so keen to make our marriage work when you believe I murdered our baby?’