A Touch of Notoriety - By Carole Mortimer Page 0,18

ago.

‘And what of your parents? Are they both still alive?’

‘My father is. My mother died shortly after my tenth birthday.’

Beth gave a pained frown. ‘I’m sorry.’

He shrugged. ‘So am I.’

‘It can’t have been easy for your father to bring up all those children on his own.’

‘He remarried when I was sixteen.’ Raphael’s jaw had become inflexible.

As evidence that he didn’t like his stepmother? Perhaps this was the reason Rosa lived with her eldest sister, and perhaps another reason why Beth always sensed a stiltedness in Raphael’s manner whenever his family was mentioned in conversation.

She had sensed some sort of tension between Raphael and his family when Esther had enquired after them two days ago. Possibly one that had been created by Raphael’s desire to escape from his father’s second marriage as well as the poverty of his childhood...

That need to escape would certainly fit in with the years he had spent in the military. It would also explain the impatience he showed towards Beth’s rejection of the idea of becoming a member of the wealthy Navarro family.

Raphael had absolutely no idea what thoughts were going through Beth’s head at that moment, but whatever they were they had brought a frown to her creamy brow. Just as he was aware of the frown between his own eyes as he realised he was sitting on the side of the bed with Beth cradled in his arms...

Despite her outer veneer of toughness, Beth felt utterly soft and very feminine with her breasts pressing against the hardness of his chest, her back feeling softly sensual as his hands ran lightly over the material of her T-shirt, the softness of her silky blond hair smelling of citrus fruits, her perfume—something lightly floral and utterly feminine that was uniquely Beth—having invaded his senses and at the same time lowered his defences.

Defences Raphael knew he could not allow to be lowered with a woman he found as beautiful and intriguingly enticing as he did Beth Blake. Even less so in regard to Gabriela Navarro, the woman he was here to protect.

He removed his arms abruptly before standing up and moving sharply away from her. ‘If you like I will take you upstairs now and show you the gym?’

She blinked at the sudden change of subject, before that surprise was quickly masked and she smiled brightly. ‘Feel like joining me?’

Raphael’s lids narrowed warily. ‘Sorry?’

She stood up, lean and slender in a blue sweater and fitted low-rider denims. ‘Grace said that you and Cesar often spar together in the gym...’

‘Yes.’

She grinned. ‘I have a black belt in karate.’

Raphael drew in a sharp breath. ‘And you are suggesting that the two of us should now spar together,’ he murmured doubtfully.

She quirked a mocking brow. ‘Is your reluctance because I’m a woman?’

‘My reluctance has nothing to do with your being a woman—’ He broke off as she gave a disparaging snort. ‘It has nothing to do with your being a woman, Beth,’ he insisted firmly, ‘and everything to do with the fact that I was in a special unit of the Argentinian army for several years.’

‘And?’ She shrugged.

‘And I have...skills that are far beyond those of karate,’ he explained grimly.

‘And would those skills include knowing how to disarm and kill someone with your bare hands?’

‘If necessary, yes,’ he admitted harshly.

None of Beth’s inner shock showed in her expression—why should it, when she had already guessed, from the predatory stillness that always surrounded Raphael, that he could be lethal, physically as well as emotionally? ‘And have you ever felt it necessary?’

‘Yes.’ A nerve pulsed in the tension of his jaw.

‘Well, let’s hope you won’t find it necessary today,’ she dismissed lightly.

‘Beth—’

‘Oh, come on, Raphael, hand-to-hand combat is going to be much more fun than that punch bag with your own or Cesar’s photo pinned on it!’

He drew in a deep, controlling breath. ‘Not if you are the one who ends up black and blue.’

‘And is that likely to happen?’

‘Not if I can avoid it, no,’ he bit out grimly.

Beth looked at him searchingly for several seconds, once again noting that quiet but lethal strength that proclaimed him a predator; the clenched fists at his sides, the determined set of his jaw and the piercing blue of his narrowed eyes. All indications that this man, beneath the expensive trappings of civility he wore so well—those designer label suits, and the silk shirts and ties—was in fact a fighting machine. Lean, dangerous and, by his own admission, ultimately deadly.

And yet...

‘I trust you not to