Filthy Rich Revenge: A Filthy Rich Billionaires Book - Lynn Raye Harris Page 0,37
every last breath in her body.
They left the hotel by the front entrance. The paparazzi snapped photos and called out to him, but he ignored them. Soon enough they were in the car, moving down the drive and out into the paseo. The silence crushed down on her until she had to speak.
“The hotel is even better than I remembered.”
“Gracias.”
“The service is impeccable.”
“Sí.”
Rebecca sighed. There was only one thing she could say to him.
“I’m sorry, Alejandro.”
15
He turned his head. She was looking out the window, her arms folded beneath her breasts, the material of her dress softly shimmering in the light leaking into the car. The fabric skimmed her curves like a lover, clung to all the peaks and hollows he wanted to explore.
“What are you sorry for, Rebecca?”
Her eyes met his, huge blue pools in her beautiful face. Her throat moved as she swallowed. “What happened. Your parents.”
He was too weary to try and put a positive spin on it. “They do what they do. It has always been so.”
“Is it true? About the actress, I mean.”
“It was,” he replied. “But no longer.”
“That was her you were talking to, wasn’t it?”
He sighed. “Sí. But she will not get what she wants. I will ruin her first.” He’d warned Isabella Ayala what he would do if he ever heard of her with his father again. Juan would find another mistress—he always did—and Carmen would accept it readily enough. But Isabella was angling for a ring, for wealth and position. He’d set her straight. Without him, his parents had no money of their own. And he would not hesitate to cut his father off without a Euro should Isabella succeed in her quest.
“Do you ever get tired, Alejandro?”
“¿Que?” He came back to himself with a start, focusing on the woman across from him.
She leaned across the seat and put her hands on his knees. The warmth of her palms through the fabric of his trousers stunned him. The drumbeat of desire flared to life in his blood.
Dios, he couldn’t even remember the question she’d asked. If she were to run those palms up his thighs and over his cock, he’d be a very happy man.
Her soft voice brought him back to the moment. “It must be very tiring seeing the world in black and white, ruining people right and left. It’s okay to see shades of gray, you know, to not always need to control everything around you. The world will still go around. You don’t have to make it move.”
Something knifed into his heart. She pushed away from him, breaking that electric contact, and he found himself staring at her. Since he was a boy, he’d always needed to be in control. He’d needed to order his world as best he could. Control was his security blanket.
“You know nothing of it,” he snapped. “I have always had to be responsible, to take care of myself and my family. Control is everything.”
She looked sad. “It’s not the only thing.”
He sliced a hand through the air, dismissing her. “Sí, it is everything. My parents have never understood the need for control either. Did you not notice this tonight?”
She bowed her head. “I understand you might have been embarrassed, but—”
“Embarrassed?” He laughed harshly. “Dios, if only it were that simple. No, those two have always subjected me—and Roberto and Valencia—to their tantrums, their rages, their personal dramas. If I hadn’t found the control they lacked within myself, I would not be who I am today.”
He pinched the bridge of his nose. “Roberto died because he had no strength. He was just like my parents in his own way, and he paid the price. Valencia married her Parisian and rarely returns to Spain.”
“I didn’t know,” she said softly. “I’m sorry.”
She watched him with those sympathetic eyes and he found himself teetering on the edge. How had she seen so deeply into him? Or was it simply a coincidence?
A sudden need to lash out at her, to inflict pain, overtook him.
He spoke with scorn. “We cannot all have a privileged life like yours, Rebecca. Some of us have to work very hard to succeed.”
She choked out a laugh. “Oh God, you think you know everything, don’t you?” Her blue gaze flashed. “Well you don’t. So don’t presume to tell me how I’ve lived my life.”
“I know that you had a fortune handed to you on a silver platter. And that you and your father mismanaged everything so badly you leveraged your company to the hilt.