Liza had always liked Nick’s mother, a small, dark, very pretty woman, rather like Audrey Hepburn she had always thought. Today Anna Menendez was wearing what was obviously a Chanel suit. The other guests consisted of two elderly couples whom Liza had never seen before, and two young couples.
She felt rather underdressed and she could kill Nick for not telling her what to expect, and leaving her alone to face strangers. But with instant death to Nick, her nemesis, not an option…Liza straightened her shoulders and with all the poise she could muster she said, ‘Hello, Anna.’
‘Liza, how wonderful to see you again, it has been far too long.’ And suddenly Liza was being kissed on both cheeks and enveloped in a cloud of very expensive French perfume. For the next ten minutes she was subjected to a flurry of questions about her own mother and her work, and finally another invitation.
‘Your mother is coming at the end of March for Easter. We have not seen each other since she married again, but apparently Jeff has agreed to look after the business, so I am really looking forward to her stay,’ Anna told her. ‘You must come with her, we can have a real girlie break, shopping and gossiping. You must not be a stranger again. I was really angry with Niculoso for taking off to Lanzarote yesterday when he had promised faithfully to be in Granada for his Uncle Thomas’s celebration. But I totally forgive him because he found you.’ And, lifting a small, elegant hand, she patted Liza’s cheek.
‘It is great to be here. And I am sorry to hear you have been unwell,’ and, studying the older woman’s face, Liza was struck by the fact Anna looked positively blooming, her dark eyes, so like her son’s, were clear and twinkling merrily.
Anna gave her a most peculiar look. ‘Did Nick tell you that?’
‘Well, not exactly,’ Liza had to amend honestly when she thought about what Nick had actually said last night. But he had known perfectly well Liza had jumped to the conclusion his mother was ill, and played on her sympathetic nature. ‘He said you had been a bit down, but you look great.’
‘Oh, he probably meant the small chest infection I had a couple of weeks ago, but I am fine now, never better. But you know what men are, always exaggerating. Yesterday he left me a note saying he had to attend an emergency meeting with Carl Dalk and took off in the jet to Lanzarote. I doubt if it was really that vital and I expected Nick to bring Carl back with him. But instead he brought you, dear, for which I am very grateful. You didn’t happen to meet Carl, did you?’
Liza shook her head. ‘No.’ Her smooth brow creased in a puzzled frown at Anna’s revelation.
‘Maybe that’s just as well. He is very handsome and very wealthy, but what those two get up to together is anybody’s guess. I know Carl still encourages Nick in the extreme sports, long after the pair of them should have given up such things.’ She shook her dark head. ‘Still, it is lovely to have you here, and you will come back with your mother?’
Liza smiled down at Anna, feeling slightly better. ‘It is great to be here,’ she responded. ‘As for March, I will try.’ But as she said it she knew she would not. Her affair, if that was what it was, with Nick was for a limited period, and she would probably never see Anna again after this.
In fact, the more she thought about it away from Nick’s disturbing presence, the more her suspicions were aroused. She was beginning to wonder why Nick had been so eager for her to come to Spain with him for the party. Was it just her sex appeal, as he said? Hardly likely, she thought ruefully, because she’d never thought she had much. Plus Nick’s story to his mother about an urgent meeting in Lanzarote with this Carl chap didn’t ring true. Nick had spent almost the whole day and the evening with her. He could hardly have meant the two-minute visit to the building site…could he…?
‘Is Carl Dalk in the construction industry?’ Liza asked Anna.
‘No.’ Anna grinned, and stretched out an arm to show Liza a brilliant diamond bracelet. ‘This is Carl’s business, diamonds, but I get the impression from Nick all is not—’
Nick walked up behind Liza just in time to hear Carl’s name mentioned.
‘Ah, Mamma. You have met Liza,’ he interrupted quickly, cutting out whatever his mother was going to say. ‘Now, I want to steal her away from you for a moment to introduce her to Uncle Thomas.’
Liza tensed as his large hand curved around her upper arm in a firm grip. Nice of him to arrive at last, but what had got into him, interrupting the conversation like that? She shot him a puzzled sidelong glance, her resentment ri
sing when she realised he was dressed in a perfectly tailored silver-grey suit, white shirt and silk tie. He looked magnificent and his assured masculinity took her breath away, but when her gaze reached his darkly handsome face she saw he was smiling but the humour didn’t reach his eyes; instead his dark gaze was veiled, masking all expression.
Anna Menendez, at the age of sixty, was nobody’s fool. ‘You do that.’ Her small head swivelled between the tall, beautiful girl and her huge son. The tension between the two was palpable and she knew her only son too well not to realise he was up to something. If it was what she thought it was she could not be more pleased, but at thirty-five Niculoso was very set in his ways. He had the same charm and charisma as her late husband—more, in fact. But he also had an arrogant, cynical edge where women were concerned that his father, as a happily married man, had never suffered from. ‘But I will speak to you later, Niculoso.’
Two pairs of identical dark eyes clashed, and Nick was the first to look away.
Seeing the look between mother and son, Liza knew something was going on here she did not understand. ‘Wait a minute,’ she began, turning a frowning gaze on Nick. ‘I—’
‘Later,’ Nick said smoothly, tightening his grip on Liza’s arm. ‘My uncle is dying to meet you.’ And he propelled her across the room in front of him. She looked stunning, and her behind in those trousers was doing wicked things to his libido.
Nick could not believe it! He had never known a woman in his life take so little time to get dressed, and he had known plenty. It was barely an hour ago when he had left Liza in bed, for heaven’s sake! It never entered his head she would get to his mother before he did. Heaven knew what his mother had said. But he had a damn good idea he was going to find out, and not just from Liza, but from his mother as well. Not something he was looking forward to. He doubted the man was ever born who could hide anything successfully from his own mother.
Standing at Nick’s side, Liza silently fumed, His uncle was dying to meet her? Since when? she wondered acidly. She didn’t believe it for a minute. Then, running over the conversation with Anna, she suddenly stiffened, shooting Nick an angry glance. ‘You…’ She tried to pull her arm free. He had not wanted her talking to his mother, that much was obvious.
‘I said later,’ Nick growled between gritted teeth, and then in a complete turn-about, charm oozing from every pore, ‘Uncle Thomas,’ he addressed the small man in front of them, ‘I want you to meet Liza; she is the daughter of Pamela Summers, Mamma’s English friend.’
In a flurry of introductions Liza met Thomas’s wife, Ellen, her brother, Paulo, and his wife, and discovered the two young couples were not couples at all, but the sons and daughters of Thomas and Paulo; she caught the name Marco…he looked vaguely familiar, but the rest of the names were lost.
In the general conversation that followed Liza realised Thomas and Ellen were celebrating their golden wedding. Last night there’d been a dinner at their home in Granada. The dinner Nick had missed… Today a family lunch with Anna and tonight Anna was hosting a party for all their friends and relatives.
‘I want to talk to you,’ Liza muttered in a swift aside to Nick as with a hand at her back he led her to her seat at the exquisitely prepared dining table. ‘This is a family lunch and I feel terrible, an interloper…’
But the hand Nick had at her spine slipped around her slender waist, and halted them both. He stared down at her with intent black eyes. ‘You are not an interloper. I told you before, you’re a welcome guest.’
‘So you say,’ she muttered, ‘but you could have told me…I’m not dressed.’