CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER ONE
Diaz Martinez strode through the lobby of his Mayfair hotel and descended the wide stairs to the restaurant. He noted with unsmiling satisfaction that every table was occupied, the hum of chatter only slightly higher than the specially chosen melodious background music. A number of diners were taking pictures of their food. Their expressions suggested their social media postings would be favourable. As it should be.
In the kitchen, ordered chaos ensued. The head chef, whose famous name was on the restaurant door, ‘Tom Carlow at the Martinez,’ noticed Diaz’s appearance but was too busy to do anything but nod an acknowledgement. As it should be.
When Diaz had bought the worn-down hotel two years ago, he’d known it would take time and money to bring it up to the standard of his other hotels. The previous owners had driven it to the wall. By the time they’d been forced to sell, their client base, fed up with overinflated prices for substandard service and crumbling decor, had deserted them, the hotel reduced to ridicule.
No one was ridiculing it now. A full-scale refurbishment followed by stringent hiring and an unrelenting attention to detail meant the grand reopening, filled with specially curated guests, had been hailed a spectacular success. Hiring the Michelin-starred Tom Carlow as head chef had been just one of many components that had seen the latest chain in Diaz’s empire pay back tenfold the investment he’d put into it.
Back in the lobby, he climbed the cantilevered stairs two at a time to the first floor and swept past the doormen and into the hotel’s real money pit. The casino.
Almost nine o’clock on a Saturday evening and already the atmosphere was thrumming. Where the music in the restaurant was kept low-key to enable his diners to relax, the volume in the casino was upped, the tempo fast. In another hour, all the gambling tables would be full and would remain full until the early hours. People would have to wait their turn to play on the slots. As it should be.
Satisfied that standards hadn’t slipped in his absence, he headed for the door at the far end, using his fingerprint to open it.
Imagining the large Scotch he’d have when he retired to his suite for the night, he walked the narrow corridor to the far end, then used his fingerprint and inputted the access code to enter his security hub.
The Hub, as it was known, was the unseen heart of his casino, containing almost as many monitors as patrons. Not an inch of the first floor went unobserved. Everyone, from the guests to the croupiers to the tellers, knew they were being watched. None of them knew just how closely.
‘Has it started?’ Diaz asked, taking his usual seat.
‘Eight minutes,’ Jorge answered, not averting his eyes from the screens in front of him.
Once a month, Diaz hosted a private poker event that was the most sought-after ticket in the gambling world. He rotated the venue. Last month he’d held it in Madrid, next month it would be in Paris. To gain entry, you had to apply. For your application to be successful, you had to produce proof of a minimum ten million euros or equivalent in a deposit account. To play, you needed to bring that ten million euros—or equivalent—in cash. Sixteen players. Winner takes all. One hundred and sixty million euros. Ten per cent handed to the casino—Diaz—in fees.
Diaz always made sure to be there, not to gamble—to his mind, only fools gambled—but to oversee. When that kind of money was at stake, anything could happen.
He studied the monitors surveying the private room the event was being held in. Chyna, hostess that evening, was welcoming the selected fools into the room. ‘Usual faces?’
‘Mostly. A couple of new ones.’
Diaz nodded his approval. Fresh blood was always welcome.
To apply, you needed to know about the event and only a very select number of people were in the know. Those who attended did not like to risk their places by widening the competition pool. It was Jorge’s job to vet the applicants and rubber-stamp their place.
‘Coffee?’
Jorge didn’t look up from the screens. ‘Por favor.’
There were three coffee machines strategically located in The Hub. The work in here being too important to distract the staff with trivialities, Diaz always sorted his own coffee.
A couple of minutes later and he placed Jorge’s coffee in front of him, peering over his shoulder to see what was happening in the private room. The players had taken their seats. Two tables. Eight players per table. Top four players of each table went into the final…
A jolt of electricity zinged through his veins. He blinked to clear his vision and moved his stare to a different monitor, which was fixed, face on, on players seven and eight from table two.
He swore.
Jorge gave him a quick side-eye. ‘What’s wrong?’
‘Player fifteen.’
‘Ms Gregory? What about her?’
His throat had gone dry. ‘What the hell is she doing here?’
‘She passed all the checks. Do you know the lady?’
The lady in question, as if sensing their attention on her, lifted her gaze to the monitor they were watching her through.
Diaz’s heart thumped.
Clenching his jaw, he gave a grim laugh. ‘That’s no lady. That’s my wife.’
* * *
He’d seen her. She could feel his stare on her. She’d always been able to feel it, a fuzzy electrical sensation like nothing else on this earth.
Rose had been fourteen when she’d first experienced it. She’d been hiding at the bottom of the garden under the cherry tree, headphones on, listening to music, trying to drown out the noises…screams…in her head and calm the terror that had gripped her so tightly. As young as she’d been, she’d known she couldn’t fall apart. Her mother needed her. Mrs Martinez needed her.
She’d felt Diaz’s presence before she’d seen him, like an internal antenna had come to life and started softly buzzing, and hurriedly pulled her headphones off.
He’d stopped a good distance from the tree. Even then, a decade past, he’d not wanted to get close to her. She’d repelled him from the start.
His hands had been jammed in his shorts pockets, she remembered, a black T-shirt of a punk rock album cover covering his gangly torso. ‘I’m sorry to hear about your mother,’ he’d said stiffly.
She’d wanted to throw her phone at him. ‘Did your grandmother tell you to say that?’
‘I would have said it anyway.’
‘Well, you’ve said it now so don’t let me keep you.’
He’d turned away and then turned back. Hesitated before quietly asking, ‘How are you holding up?’
Her response had been to stare at him defiantly and ram the headphones back on. She would not give Diaz Martinez the satisfaction of seeing her cry. Any hint of vulnerability and he’d use it as a weapon against her.
It was with the same defiance eleven years on that she gazed into the monitor now. The same knowledge that she had to remain strong for what was to follow, whatever the turbulence beneath her skin.
The first cards had been dealt. She looked at hers and looked at the table cards. She had possibly the worst poker hand it was possible to have. She pushed all her playing chips into the pile. ‘All in.’
There were audible gasps from her fellow players.
Only the American player, number eleven, matched her. He had a full house.
Ten million euros poorer than she’d been ten minutes earlier, Rose smiled gracefully and got to her feet at the same moment the door opened. She’d played her cards with perfect timing.
Head held high, she strolled past the remaining players, all gawping incredulously at her, towards her husband.
The gangly nineteen-year-old who’d been shamed into giving her words of sympathy over a decade ago had filled out over the years. Diaz Martinez had transformed into a six-foot-two slab of pure rangy muscle, the dark brown hair that eleven years ago had been worn long like the surf dudes who hit Devon’s beaches in droves cut short at the back and sides, the longer top squiffed up and to the side.
The green eyes that had never bothered to disguise their loathing skimmed hers before he stepped aside to let her through the door.
Without exchanging a word or a glance, they crossed the casino floor. It didn’t surprise her that he led her to the back offices rather than take her up to his suite.
The office he selected had ‘Accounts’ on its door. It smelt stale, as if its occupants never bothered to open the windows. She was quite sure he’d chosen this one deliberately.
Inside, he propped his backside on the nearest desk, folded his arms across his chest and gazed at the ceiling. In perfect, barely accented English, he said, ‘I have seen some stunts in my time but throwing ten million euros away in one hand just to get my attention is a new one on me.’
The agony at his indifference came within a breath of poleaxing her.
‘I had to get your attention somehow, didn’t I?’ she said tremulously. ‘I mean, you’ve blocked my number.’ She’d woken to an empty bed and a note that read:
My lawyers will be in touch about the divorce.
And they had been.
Of Diaz, she’d seen and heard nothing.
That note had lodged like a taunt in the forefront of her mind. She’d read it so many times the sharply executed letters had etched themselves into her retinas and into her broken heart.
‘I’ll do everything else through the lawyers but this you need to hear from me and not a suit. Not that I particularly think you deserve to hear it from me, but then, I’m not the vengeful narcissist of this so-called marriage. Keeping track of your itinerary is impossible, but I knew you’d be here tonight so took my chance. Luckily I kept my maiden name otherwise the security checks would have picked up that I had the same surname as you, which would have quite ruined the surprise.’
The firm, sensuous lips twisted. It was a twist she’d seen too many times to count. ‘Spit it out.’
‘Notice anything different about me?’
‘I do not have time for games, Rose.’
‘Neither do I, so why don’t you look at me and see for yourself why I pulled that stunt?’ It shouldn’t hurt so much that he refused to look at her. She should have expected it—she had expected it.
Diaz hated her. Shared grief had pulled them together that night, nothing more. While she’d fallen asleep locked in his arms and with a sense that the world’s axis had righted itself, he was already deep in regret. He’d extricated himself from her arms and her bed with such darkness in his heart that he’d been compelled to leave a note about their divorce. The final cruelty had been where he’d left the note—on the pillow where his head should have been.
The night that had meant everything to her had meant nothing to him, and she would never, never make the mistake of allowing emotions to play any part in their relationship again.
Teeth gritted, heart furiously pumping, Diaz let his stare fall to the face he’d last seen in the flesh four months ago while she’d been sleeping.
She looked the same as she’d done then. Same large blue eyes ringed and enhanced with dramatically applied eyeliner and mascara. Same too-long nose. Same wide mouth and high cheekbones. Same long, dirty blonde hair. The same captivating beauty that had mesmerised and repelled in equal measure.
He shrugged roughly. ‘What am I looking at?’
She lifted up her index finger, then pointed it downward.
His still dry throat had closed even before his gaze followed her finger’s direction.
Same slender neck. Same slender shoulders. Same high breasts. All covered in a silk dress he didn’t recognise, black and long-sleeved, more like an oversized shirt than a dress, and which shouldn’t cling to her slender waist and flat belly…
His heart made a sudden cold, hard thump.
She pressed a hand to the belly that was no longer flat.
He shook his head in disbelief and lifted his gaze back to hers.
She nodded.
Another disbelieving shake of his head.
Another nod. The slender shoulders rose. She expelled a long breath. ‘Sorry for ruining your life again, but I’m pregnant.’
* * *
A distant emergency services siren pierced through the siren roaring in Diaz’s ears.
He grabbed tightly to the side of the desk that was the only thing stopping him from slumping to the floor. His limbs had turned to water. ‘How?’
Her answering laughter contained no humour. ‘How do you think?’
‘But… We…’
‘No, we didn’t.’
An image flashed. Rose pinned beneath him. High cheekbones slashed with colour. Blue eyes liquid with the same desire that had liquidised his loins…
The siren ringing in his ears increased tenfold.
He hung his head and tried to breathe. Tried to think coherently. That night. He never allowed himself to think about it, had locked it away.
He’d woken with the soft weight of Rose pressed against his skin and a suffocating weight pressing down on his chest. All the emotions that had taken him over when making love to her…so many emotions had broken free…had compressed under the sense of doom throbbing in the back of his head and he’d known before opening his eyes that he’d made the biggest mistake of his life.
Forgetting that mistake had been the hardest task he’d ever set himself.
He met her stare. ‘How can you be sure it’s mine?’
The face that grew more captivating with each passing year spasmed. For the first time he caught a barely perceptible glimmer of hurt. ‘How can you even ask that?’
There was a strong chance he was going to be sick.
Rose, pregnant?
‘Oh, and just for extra fun, we’re having twins.’
A wave of nausea flooded his system. He blew out a long puff of air and clasped his cheeks. ‘Twins?’
‘You never do anything by halves, do you?’ she said in another attempt at a joke, which was Rose all over. In all the years he’d known her, he’d only caught her with her defences down three times. The last time had been four months ago when both their defences had been down.
And now she was carrying his child. Children.
Unless this was her idea of a sick joke; vengeance for the way he’d left her?
But no. That wasn’t Rose’s style. Not even Rose would stoop so low as to fake a pregnancy. That bump straining against her dress…
Diaz was going to be a father. Not a father to just one child, but to twins. And Rose, the woman he was counting the days until their divorce could be filed, was their mother.
‘I need a drink,’ he muttered, rubbing the back of his head.
This was too much.
He’d thought he was finally freed from Rose’s toxic spell, that he could live the rest of his life and never have to hear her name or share her air again.
She gave a short laugh. ‘Have one for me. Believe me, there’ve been a few times these last four months when all I’ve wanted is to bury myself in a bottle of gin but I’ve got these little lives inside me to think of.’
He stared at her, dumbfounded. ‘How can you be so calm?’ Calm when he felt like a rug had been yanked out from under his feet. Scratch that. Felt like his whole world had been yanked out from under him.
Dios , Rose was pregnant with his babies.
‘I can’t say I was calm when I did the test,’ she admitted with a rueful shrug. ‘And when two heartbeats were detected on the scan…’ She gave another laugh and shook her head. ‘Two babies to bring safely into the world? Only a tiny bit terrifying. But it is what it is, and all I can do is my best.’
‘You didn’t think to…?’ He couldn’t bring himself to say it.
She recoiled in horror and covered her belly with both hands. ‘Abort them? Absolutely not. They didn’t ask to be conceived, so don’t even think of suggesting it.’
‘I didn’t…’ His voice had become hoarse. ‘I wouldn’t.’
‘Good.’ She gave a tight smile and readjusted the strap of her handbag. ‘I should go.’
‘Go?’ What the hell was she talking about? Go?
‘You need to digest the bombshell I’ve just thrown at you. Get in touch when you’re over the shock of it all and we can talk properly then. And don’t worry—the pregnancy doesn’t change anything as far as you and I are concerned.’
Rose, desperate to get away without Diaz realising just how desperate her need for escape was, left him staring at her with the expression of someone who really had suffered a grenade explosion at close quarters.
The moment the door shut behind her, she slumped against it and clasped her thighs to stop herself sinking to the floor. She was shaking, inside and out.
That had been easier than she’d imagined, and yet a hundred times harder.
Easier because Diaz had been too shocked to erupt with the anger and accusations she’d prepared herself for. Harder because all the mental preparations she’d made to be with him in the flesh again had gone to nothing.
But that was the story of her life. Diaz had always been capable of eliciting emotions in her with nothing but the mention of his name, and it destroyed her that the pain she’d tried so hard to bury had risen back up again, fragmentary memories of their night together floating like whispers to the surface. She didn’t dare risk exposing herself to those fragments, not now, and she blinked hard to push them away.
She had to get out of here. She couldn’t stay slumped against the door, not when he was on the other side it. She’d thrown a grenade into his life but Diaz was not the kind of man to stay shellshocked for long. She’d much rather be safe in Devon and in control of her surroundings for when the shock wore off and he demanded they talk. She needed every ounce of advantage she could get.
Pulling herself together, she went back into the casino and headed for the exit. As she descended the stairs she couldn’t stop herself thinking of the first time she met him. She’d been eleven, a lonely girl on the cusp of adolescence, excited that Mrs Martinez’s grandchildren were going to spend the whole of the summer holidays in Devon with them. Well, not with them . With Mrs Martinez. After all, Rose’s mother was Mrs Martinez’s live-in housekeeper. Rose was just the housekeeper’s daughter. But Mrs Martinez had never seen her like that. Certainly never treated her like that. She’d made Rose feel welcome in her home. Wanted. Only two months living there and, to Rose, it had felt like she’d finally found a grandmother.
Surely a woman as wonderful as Mrs Martinez would have wonderful grandchildren? She’d been half right.
Twelve-year-old Rosaria had been thrilled to make a friend of Rose, had marvelled at the similarity of their names and declared they would be best friends for ever.
Sixteen-year-old Diaz had been a different proposition. He’d made no effort to hide his resentment of Rose’s presence. Only days after his arrival, she’d overheard him complaining about the ‘feral’ child of the hired help leading his sister astray.
‘Why does your brother hate me?’ Rose had asked his sister after he’d flatly refused to let her walk with them to the local town for ice cream.
Rosaria had shrugged. ‘Don’t take it personally. He hates everyone.’
‘He doesn’t hate you.’
‘That’s because I’m his sister.’
She’d been confused. ‘But I thought brothers and sisters were supposed to find each other annoying?’ At least, that was the impression she’d always got from her old friendship group, where she’d been the only only-child. The others always used to say how lucky she was. They wouldn’t have thought her lucky after the move, when she’d failed to make a single friend in her new school and didn’t even have an annoying little sister to fall back on for company.
‘Diaz thinks it’s his job to look out for me,’ Rosaria had explained.
It had taken a few more years for Rose to understand why Diaz thought that way, a few more years of long school holidays spent with her favourite person—Rosaria—and the sulky presence of her least favourite—Diaz—for her to consider that if they spent their terms at their English boarding school and most of their holidays with their English grandmother, then how much time did they actually spend in their native Spain with their parents? The answer to that was not a lot.
Not her problem, Rose thought defiantly when she reached the ground floor of the hotel. She was long done with trying to understand what made Diaz Martinez tick or understand why, despite his sister’s long-ago assertion that he hated everyone, it was just Rose he abhorred. Just Rose his hackles lifted for. Just Rose he watched with distrust and suspicion.
She wished she could scratch away the memory of the night when he’d looked at her with a tenderness that had made her heart fill like a balloon.
Thanking the porter for opening the door for her, she stepped out into the early autumn air. She should have brought a jacket with her. It had been a long time since she’d been outside this late in an evening.
A black cab was approaching. The porter hailed it and opened the back door for her. He was closing it when it swung back open and Diaz slid in beside her.